Nazi gate attendant
On Alaska Airlines flight 6960 from San Jose, CA to Seattle, WA at 10:20 am on Saturday, May 28, 2011, we ran into an absolute Nazi gate attendant. It was a three-woman team. All three were very aggressive and needlessly confrontational, but the woman taking boarding passes was overly hostile and even punitive.
It started when everyone crowded around the gate. She kept telling people to back away and form one line. When people didn’t move fast enough, she started yelling.
One group of 4 who spoke little English tried to board early. I think this set her off, because she was very nasty to them and then to pretty much everyone else. They were roughly and rudely told to go to the end of the line. It was clear that they didn’t understand what she was saying.
She then demanded that each person have their own boarding pass, including children. Several families were forced with small children were not allowed to have one parent present 3-4 boarding passes for the group. The parents had to give each child, some as young as 3, their own boarding pass, which was a problem for some of the children.
This was also repeated with the carry-on luggage. Many of the small children had little cartoon roller bags. They weren’t able to walk fast enough so the parents were carrying the child’s roller bag. This caused them to have more than 2 bags, so the Nazi demanded that the child had to drag their own bag. No one was allowed through the gate with more than 2 bags, not even a parent assisting a child.
One woman had a small camera, another had a small purse, each in addition to 2 carry-ons. Any idiot could easily see that these “extra” items would easily fit inside their carry-ons, but the Nazi made them go to the side the pack them before re-entering.
When one person complained about the tone and rudeness, he was threatened with being kicked off the place.
This was a powerful disincentive to ever fly Alaska again.
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