Ryanair sparks outrage after failing to remove passenger from a plane after he launched a racist tirade against elderly woman sat next to him - and moved HER instead

  • White man can be seen jabbing at seat and shouting at elderly black woman
  • Footage recorded by passenger on flight from Barcelona to London Stansted
  • Man tells woman not to speak in 'foreign language' and to move away from him 
  • ** Do you know who the man is? Were you on the Ryanair flight? Contact bryony.jewell@mailonline.co.uk **

By Bryony Jewell For Mailonline

Published: 05:48 EDT, 21 October 2018 | Updated: 07:01 EDT, 21 October 2018

This is the shocking moment a passenger on a Ryanair flight unleashed a torrent of racist abuse at a 77-year-old woman sitting next to him - and she was moved.

A white man and a black woman can be seen with one seat between them while other outraged passengers try to calm the situation.

The incident happened on flight FR015 from Barcelona to London Stansted on Friday afternoon.

The white man told the woman to stop speaking in a 'foreign language you stupid ugly cow'
Another passenger (wearing a black t-shirt) tries to step in and stop the verbal abuse

The man (wearing glasses left and right) unleashed a torrent of racist abuse at the elderly woman sitting one seat away from him on a Ryanair flight from Barcelona to London Stansted

In the dramatic footage, which has been viewed more than one million times on Facebook, the man can be heard shouting at the woman to move seats while her daughter tries to stand up to him, telling him her mother is disabled.

He replies: 'I don't care whether she's f****** disabled or not - if I tell her to get out she gets out.' 

The agitated man then jabs at the middle seat and continues yelling at the woman.

As he points he says: 'I hope somebody sits there because I don't want to sit next to you and your ugly face, your ugly f****** face.'

The woman tries to respond and a flight attendant can be seen trying to calm the situation.

But before she can say anything in response to the bully, he shouts over her and says: 'If you don't move to another seat I'll push you there.'

A man sitting in the row behind then tries to intervene, asking the man to calm down and tells him there's 'no need' for his aggressive behaviour.

The angry man then starts on the woman again and says: 'Don't talk to me in a f*****g foreign language you stupid ugly cow'

He then adds: 'I will carry on as far as I can with this ugly, black b******.'

When the woman tries to answer back the angry man speaks over her
A flight attendant warns the man to quieten down

Other passengers try to help the woman before a flight attendant steps in and tries to calm the man down (left and right)

Other passengers can be heard gasping and the man from the row behind leans forward to put his arms between the man and woman. 

Another man can be heard saying 'throw him off the flight. Get rid of him' as the flight attendant comes back to ask the angry man to 'calm down.'

The woman is then taken to another seat on the plane, away from the man. 

The woman's daughter, 53, told the Huffington Post the row had started because her 77-year-old mother's arthritis meant it took her some time to move out of the way so the man could reach the window seat.

The daughter said she had taken her mother, who is a Windrush Generation migrant who came to the UK from Jamaica in the 1960s, on holiday to mark one year since the death of her father.

'My parents were married over 50 years. She's been feeling really down and depressed, so I thought the trip would raise her spirits.'

A passenger sitting in the row behind also tells the man to stop, saying 'there's 'no need'
Social media users have said they are shocked that it was the woman who was moved to a new seat

The woman (left) is eventually moved from her seat leaving the man alone in the row (right)

She continued: 'I know that if I was behaving like he was or any other black person for that matter, police would have been called and we would have been kicked off the flight.'

'Mum's really feeling upset and very stressed about this situation, on top of the grief she's already experiencing. As for me, I'm upset about the whole thing too - the fact that the passenger wasn't taken off the plane and how the situation was dealt with,' she said.

The woman said that when she had complained to cabin crew they denied hearing any racial slurs and they told her to ring customer services on Monday. 

Thousands of social media users have said they are outraged at the incident and it has been shared more than 22,000 times since it was posted by David Lawrence.

One person said: 'He should have been kicked off the flight and she should have been moved to FIRST CLASS.'

Another said: 'He should have been removed from the plane. No excuses for that type of behaviour. 

'It's so sad that in today's society people still carry so much hatred inside them. When will we all realise we are all humans and all bleed the same way.'  

A number of politicians voiced their concern at the incident.

MSP for Greenock and Inverclyde Stuart McMillan posted: 'This is really appalling @Ryanair . You will know the identity of the man and the level of training given to your staff.'

Fellow MSP politician Margaret Ferrier said: 'Just watched the shocking footage on a @Ryanair aircraft, utterly disgusting. Racist male passenger should have been put off flight before it departed. 

'However well done to passenger with black t-shirt that intervened £hero.' 

A spokesperson for Ryanair said: 'We have reported this to the police in Essex and as this is now a police matter, we cannot comment further.' 

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Shocking moment Ryanair passenger unleashes torrent of racist abuse at woman sitting next to him

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