Pilot fired for leaving plane for a meal in LV

Tuesday, Dec. 7, 1999 | 10:52 a.m.

A Northwest Airlines pilot was offered his choice of a pre-flight breakfast meal or pizza, but wanted neither.

Instead, he left his Boeing 757 at McCarran International Airport, jumped into a cab and went to a Las Vegas eatery, delaying his Nov. 23 flight to Detroit by 90 minutes, the airline said.

It better have been one heck of a meal because it cost him a well-paying job he had held for 22 years.

Northwest Airlines says it fired the pilot for his unusual actions.

The average pilot's salary for Northwest Airlines is $130,000 a year, the company said.

"He acted to the detriment of his passengers, fellow employees and his company," Northwest spokesman Jon Austin said from the company's headquarters in Eagan, Minn. "That is grounds for dismissal."

The airline declined to release the name of the pilot, his age or his town of residence, nor would it say where the pilot went to eat or what he ordered.

The incident occurred before a pre-Thanksgiving flight when the pilot refused the two choices his crew offered and "spoke within hearing range of the passengers at the front of the plane," declaring he was leaving to eat elsewhere, Austin said.

The co-pilot remained with the plane and made announcements to passengers apologizing for the delay, Austin said.

Passengers later complained about the incident, the airline said.

The pilot "could have gone inside the airport and eaten at one of the places there," Austin said, noting that he would not have been fired for that.

A Boeing 757 is a single-aisle plane that holds 200 passengers.

The pilot is represented by the Airline Pilots Association and can appeal the decision through the union. Austin said that as of early today an appeal had not been filed.