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"My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
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RedLantern
12/10/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
I knew a girl in college who had, as a child or teenager, been flying with her grandmother when she died. The plane unloaded her grandmother's body when they had a layover and put my friend up in a hotel for the night. Alone. THAT'S trauma.

As for this woman, I don't love her attitude...."They put a body where I could see him. ME!" But I think she's entitled to some compensation. People die on planes. The airline knows that. They should have money set aside and a plan in place for comp tickets or even a small settlement. Not because it was her honeymoon or because she was in first class, but because....come on.
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LeeroySpitzer
12/10/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
seriously, fuck planes.
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pesematology
12/10/09

@LeeroySpitzer: I love that they always include this.
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Dream Pantomime
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
Hannibal Lecter: Splendid. Finally some decent food on this airline.
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seat_5a
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
My dad had someone die next to him during a flight. The attendants asked if it was okay if they left the body there since there was no other room on the flight. He didn't say no, but in retrospect, it sort of haunts him. He tells the story frequently and in a way that you can tell it bugs him. The dead guy's wife was right there too.

Anyway, I think the person deserves some sort of compensation. Heck, I bet even a letter acknowledging a crappy situation and a small offer would've helped.
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Jenloveshercurves
12/09/09

@seat_5a: He should have said yes, but I want to be comped for possibly risking my life.
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hydrogen_jukebox
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
I know he says the same thing every time, but the Kerouac never fails to make me laugh.
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Belli
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
Tyler Durden: You are not your airplane seat.

Also, I'm not actually sure Marie Antoinette would say that at all. She was very kind and generous to the poor, to the point where her own class called her out on it hardcore. I really recommend both "Queen of Fashion: What Marie Antoinette Wore To The Revolution" by a lady I don't remember and "Marie Antoinette" by Antonia Fraiser.
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mmoss
12/10/09

@Belli: Or rather -

Tyler Durden: The corpse of the passenger sitting next to you may be used as a flotation device.
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CherriSpryte
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
Arwen: Ruined by a corpse!? Starting in a few decades from now, I'll be spending all of eternity married to a corpse!
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hughman
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
did she take his bag of salted almonds? that's $25 right there.
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EndangeredRed
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
Every time, I think the Kerouac thing will get old, but it never does.
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squid pro quo
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
It never ceases to amaze me how bratty people become about air travel. Oh so you just got MARRIED and had a fabulous trip to South Africa and this other poor bastard lost his life and his family lost a loved one. Clearly, this woman should be compensated for such a hardship. Just because you just had your pretty princess day doesn't mean the cycle of life will pause until the thank you notes are sent. How could this possibly be the airline's problem?

And while you probably wouldn't want to let a dead body flop around in your studio apartment for a few weeks, I'm pretty sure no one is going to be infected by a fresh corpse for a few hours. I was once on a European flight and the bathrooms were all full and a woman was having some sort of diaper emergency with her baby. She put a changing pad down in the section outside of the bathrooms in the back away from the seats and went to town. My understanding was that if she didn't change the diaper swiftly the baby would have a meltdown. Well some delicate woman went completely ballistic about the health issues of this and how the whole plane was now at risk of e. coli and dysentery. I wanted to slap her face.

We all shit, vomit, and die. Just because one of those things happens to someone else in your immediate vicinity doesn't mean you get free tickets to Honolulu.
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ronniedobbs
12/09/09

@squid pro quo: I couldn't agree more. And that last line about sums it up, doesn't it?
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Edited by ronniedobbs at 12/09/09 6:56 PM ronniedobbs was starred ronniedobbs was unstarred

Dizzy8
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
I don't know why, but something about that woman's letter made me think she's a total pill.

I'm not excusing the airline. I just think she's being obnoxious. Ok, yes, you spent hours in close quarters with a corpse. Does it really matter that you were recently married? Is there some rule that no service employee is allowed to throw shit your way for a set period of time, post-nuptials? The flight attendants were dealing with a dead body and trying to bother as few people as possible. The time to speak up was when you were on the plane staring at Bernie. Not when you're on the ground, trying to collect for your honeymoon suffering.

But maybe I'm less sympathetic because I think it would be AWESOME to have that as my honeymoon story.
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ronniedobbs
12/09/09

@Dizzy8: I think I would be a teeny bit more sympathetic if the letter had simply begun with: "I was flying first class for the first time ever (my honeymoon, big splurge!) and..." Or if she had expressed even an ounce of compassion for the dead guy and his loved ones.
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Bunsen Honeydew
12/09/09

@Dizzy8: You know, I saw the headline and thought it was going to be the story of how the bellhop in their hotel was murdered halfway through the week and she found it, and can't get the image out of her mind and is terribly distraught at witnessing the loss of life, some sort of emotional agony. You know, something where she can't remember her honeymoon without melting down due to the gruesome inhumanity of a life ended unjustly. I thought I would feel really bad for her.

But no, silly me. It's probably Karen, from Tracie's bridezilla posts, upset that a $9 an hour human being dared to die near her.
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LawFairy
12/09/09

@ronniedobbs: That's a little unfair. So she should only be entitled to a good honeymoon flight if she isn't rich? If she's ever flown first class before in her life then her honeymoon doesn't deserve to be as special? That's a bit of reverse classism. I have flown first class a few times before (I am NOT rich, but I have a lot of airline miles) and absolutely want to do so again for my honeymoon because first class is AWESOME. If this had happened to me, would I deserve less sympathy because I've had a first class flight before?

I think she's completely within her rights. Of course it's awful that someone died on the flight -- but the airline also affirmatively acted here. The airline made the CHOICE to move the dead body to some other place on the plane, at which point the location/disposition of the body became their responsibility. And, sorry, as someone with a phobia of zombies (phobias are inherently irrational, okay?) I am one hundred percent on her side here. Just because you wouldn't be bothered by a dead body seated right fucking across from you on your honeymoon doesn't mean someone else is unreasonable for feeling differently. And, yeah, I would hope/expect that people would have a little more consideration for me on my honeymoon, because Lord knows I've gone out of my way to be nice to people on their honeymoon, so fair's fair.

Also, if you read carefully it's clear that she DID protest while she was still on the flight, and that they made up some bullshit excuse about people's health. She's absolutely right to point out this supposed explanation doesn't fly at all. The airline is clearly in the wrong on this one, hate her for flying first class all you like.
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ronniedobbs promoted this comment Edited by LawFairy at 12/09/09 7:48 PM LawFairy was starred LawFairy was unstarred

ronniedobbs
12/09/09

@LawFairy: I didn't say anything about her being rich -- I was simply offering up the rephrasing as an example of how she could have made mention of the honeymoon without being all "BUT NOTHING BAD SHOULD HAPPEN ON MY HONEYMOON!" about things.

Again, I'm not saying that the entire scenario is unsympathetic, but by setting it up as an affront to the good time to which she's entitled as a newly married, and by bypassing the human compassion that the story merits on behalf of the person who died (a man who probably would rather have enjoyed his own trip to South Africa instead), she makes herself sound like a bit of an asshole.

That's all. There's no "kill the rich" story in my comment (which I shouldn't even have to say).
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Edited by ronniedobbs at 12/09/09 8:12 PM ronniedobbs was starred ronniedobbs was unstarred

LawFairy
12/09/09

@ronniedobbs: So because someone died, which of course is sad and awful but is also the only information we have (for instance, what if he went on this flight against his doctor's recommendation? Most people don't just up and die without prior health problems), suddenly she is obligated to put aside her own feelings and the fact that this is supposed to be the most exciting time of her life to feel bad for a complete stranger? I don't buy it. There is nothing wrong or unreasonable or unfair about her wanting a good honeymoon. People die every second -- should she ignore her own honeymoon and start feeling bad for all of them too? Empathy and compassion are important, of course, but she also has a right to live her own life and to not want one of the happiest moments of her life interrupted by sadness in a stranger's. I promise you a day will come when she will have plenty of sad shit to deal with herself.
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ronniedobbs
12/09/09

@LawFairy: Damn dude, did you write the letter? I understand getting passionate about one side or the other, but for all of my qualifiers (in both comments), I don't really get why mine is the response in the thread that has you so heated.

I already said the situation itself is not entirely unsympathetic, but her framing of it puts her at number six on the list of people I feel bad about in this whole thing, after the dead guy, his loved ones, the flight attendants, the other passengers, and myself, for having to defend a reaction to the situation that most compassionate people would have. She was tied for #3 or #4 about a half hour ago!
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jinxedluck
12/09/09

@LawFairy: I had a problem with her reactions not because of her "I was on my honeymoon," but because she was all "how dare they! I was a first class customer!" Don't get me wrong, I don't think anyone should have to be next to a corpse if they don't want to be, but things happen and they couldn't really have just tossed the body overboard just to save people's comfort. It sounded to me like her biggest complaint was that he died in coach, and they had the nerve to move him to first class (good way to get an upgrade, I suppose). Like she has more of a right to her comfort level as a human being because she paid first class. Would she have complained as much if the man who had died had been a first class customer?
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KLondike5
12/09/09

@LawFairy: I think you're giving the airline more responsibility for the situation than they really have.

Not only could they not control the health of their passengers, they have limited options for what to do with the body...but also, they didn't make this woman take her honeymoon, or give her an irrational fear of cadavers. I don't see how they're on the hook for doing anything more than getting her to her destination safely, first class or not.

They're an airline, not a therapist, or a concierge. Making her life super duper no matter what is not really in their job description. If the warm towels and deluxe snacks aren't enough to make her happy, oh well.

If they really, really valued her business, they could have comped her some tickets. But I guess they didn't. So she should take her business elsewhere. Free market and all that.

She wasn't happy, but she wasn't harmed either. If the airline is glad to see the back of her, that's their call.
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brenner at large
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
Mark Twain: pity the living in first class, envy the dead man's upgrade.
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Sadie
12/09/09

@brenner at large: Nice!
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sayah
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
Stephanie Tanner: How rude!
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sybann
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
The airlines just do not care anymore. Their profit margin is so thin she's really lucky they didn't charge her for making her flight more memorable.
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everydaystranger
12/09/09

In reply to "My Honeymoon Was Ruined By A Corpse"
My stepmum is a purser for an airline, and one night over wine that I poured all too freely to get good stories of airline life, she told me of the sheer total number of flights she has been on where someone offs it, and that in general they tend to lock said deceased in a lavatory and lock it, labelling it "Out of Service". It's not uncommon. Creepy, yes, but not uncommon.
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AmbiguouslyStraightUno
12/09/09

@everydaystranger: I actually that would have been way more appropriate that what this woman described.
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small-fox
12/09/09

@everydaystranger: A teacher of mine was on a flight to Hawaii in which someone died shortly after takeoff, and a flight attendant managed to keep the new widow emotionally together enough to not wail and freak out all the other passengers while her dead husband was locked in the lavatory. For the entirety of a 6+ hour flight. She lost it, apparently, the second they touched down.
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MalinaMango
12/09/09

@everydaystranger: I just played "Ask the Flight Attendant" with my own mom, and she says her airline's policy is to cover them with a blanket and say that they're sleeping, as they're not allowed to legally declare anyone dead. She's only had one person die in flight, but it was before takeoff, so they just waited on the runway for the coroner to show up.
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jigglyball
12/09/09

@MalinaMango: But don't dead people have ... emissions? I'm not trying to be immature, but I don't see how, "Corpse here is just sleeping," could really fly (no pun intended), especially as the flight drags on*.

* I have no actual knowledge of the workings of dead bodies. I am basing this on conjecture and movies.
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MalinaMango
12/09/09

@jigglyball: That's what I thought. She said they'll do what they can to move other people away from the "sleeping" person, but since they have no right to declare them dead, they can't go stuffing them in a closet. I also don't think corpses start smelling immediately. Considering planes usually smell like ass anyway, I'm guessing it's not an issue?
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jigglyball
12/09/09

@MalinaMango: Good point, planes are loud and smelly. What about the pee and the poo? I'm sorry, I'm gross and fascinated.
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Grasshopperator
12/09/09

@jigglyball: yes, when people die their bowels are dispelled. But I'd honestly rather sit through a flight thinking the sleeping guy next to me shat himself instead of enduring the chaos of 200+ passengers who are freaking out because they're stuck on a plane with a dead body. just sayin.
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jigglyball
12/09/09

@Grasshopperator: You have a point.
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ShrikirtiRaven
12/09/09

@jigglyball: i think it would depend on any medical conditions they would have had, and the temperature in the plane, etc...affecting the rate of decomposition, rigor mortis, etc...

I'm fascinated too, but I heard a lot of airlines carry coffins in case someone dies. Do they not use them?

An article that was interesting:
[url] [www.guardian.co.uk] [/url]
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MalinaMango
12/09/09

@jigglyball: I looked in my mom's training manual and there's hilariously little information. Just "Don't allow the suspected dead person to remain in an exit row." Those dead people really suck at opening exit doors.
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jigglyball
12/09/09

@MalinaMango: If they have the nerve to up and die, they could at least help out a little. Yeesh.
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BytheSea
12/09/09

@everydaystranger: I've heard of putting them in the flight attendant's seats which are behind a curtain or bulkheador something.

Also, jst for lulz: on Consumerist there was one of these stories, except add a grieving widow ululating nonstop for a 15 hour flight from the other side of the planet to America.
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BytheSea
12/09/09

@jigglyball: My grandfather's a retired cop. He says: sometimes they do, sometimes not.
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Edited by BytheSea at 12/09/09 9:43 PM BytheSea was starred BytheSea was unstarred

dangerslut
12/09/09

@jigglyball: Not all the time. Every stiff is different.
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jigglyball
12/10/09

@dangerslut: I want you to know that I'm quoting you on that. And in non-dead-people situations.
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everydaystranger
12/10/09

@MalinaMango: I haven't asked, but my stepmum has had a number of people die on flights. She has, on no less than two occasions, had crew members who died and thus faced with putting them in the lavatory again. I think I find the lavatory method less repellent than leaving them in the seats, actually. That may be simply my fears of germs getting into fiber seats that I may later get to sit on.
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