American Airlines removed a Michigan family from a plane in Florida on Wednesday night over what the airline said were complaints from other passengers about their body odor.
Yossi Adler, his wife, Jennie, and their 19-month-old daughter were passengers on a Miami-to-Detroit flight when ground crew asked them to step off the plane. They then closed the door closed behind them.
“They said, ‘Sir, people have complained that you have body odor,'” Adler told NBC News on Thursday. “I said: ‘Excuse me? I need to get home. There is no body odor on me.'”
The family who had vacationed in Florida made it back to Detroit on Thursday. The airline stood behind its decision.
“The Adler family were asked to deplane last night after several passengers, along with our crew members, complained about their body odor,” American Airlines said in a statement. “The family were provided hotel accommodations and meals, and re-booked on a flight to Detroit today.”
Yossi Adler is a 36-year-old business consultant from Southfield, Michigan. He has accused the airline of singling out his family because they’re Jewish. He used his cellphone to tape his argument with the ground crew shortly after they were taken off the plane.
“There’s a religious reason for some reason that they’re kicking me off the plane. We don’t have odor, OK? Nobody here has odor,” Adler is heard saying on the video he shot.
A ground crew member can be heard on the recording asking, “Now you told me for religious reasons you don’t shower, is that what you said?”
Adler responded: “No I didn’t! I shower every day. I said you kicked me off because of religious reasons.”
American Airlines insisted that body odor, not religion, was behind Wednesday night’s actions.
After they were back in the Detroit on Thursday, Alder insisted he didn’t smell on Wednesday night and that he and his wife bathe first thing every morning.
“And they still haven’t said which one of us they said had body odor. Was it me, my wife, my baby?” he said.
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