FORT WORTH, Texas: An unnamed American Airlines agent at Dallas-Fort Worth Airport is being applauded on social media for his calm demeanor after coming face to face with a woman who apparently cursed at a flight attendant during a mask dispute.

The incident was caught on video - it was posted on Twitter - and shows the agent speaking to the woman.

“Second of all, you called my employee a b----, completely uncalled for and inappropriate,” the agent said. “We don’t tolerate that c--p with us at all.”

He told the woman that she was no longer welcome to fly American.

According to the Dallas Morning News, the incident occurred July 17 on a flight from DFW to Miami when an attendant spoke to the passenger about her mask. The video was captured by another passenger, Christopher Freeman, as the plane was being reboarded after the woman had been removed from the flight.

The US Federal Aviation Administration has a “zero tolerance for unruly and dangerous behaviour” from passengers and states that “no person may assault, threaten, intimidate, or interfere with a crewmember in the performance of the crewmember’s duties aboard an aircraft being operated”.

Unfortunately, it has been a common occurrence for flight attendants and gate agents to have to deal with unruly passengers, especially over mask disputes during the Covid-19 pandemic. So far this year the FAA has investigated 3,509 unruly passenger reports and 2,605 mask-related incidents.

 - TNS