Airline passenger contradicts applause reports: 'I can't believe they made a story like this out of that'

• Goodyear family's story of passengers applauding as they were escorted off plane went viral
• The 7-year-old child had an allergic reaction, possibly to a dog that was on the plane.
• The family is trying to check items off a bucket list as the child's father battles cancer.

Two passengers on the Allegiant Air flight an Arizona family was escorted off of this week said applause from other passengers  was minimal,  short lived and did not appear to be malicious.

They also say Allegiant's crew handled the Goodyear family's medical emergency on the Bellingham, Wash., to Mesa flight professionally.

The incident received widespread media coverage Thursday after Christina Fabian, a 42-year-old Goodyear woman, wrote a Facebook post about the family's experience, noting that her 7-year-old son was having an allergic reaction and was hurt by the clapping. She also sent the post to a Washington-area TV station.

A different story

Carole Burton and Janet VanderYacht, who live in Washington and visit Mesa frequently, said in interviews that they are dismayed at widespread media reports painting passengers on Allegiant Flight 171 as cold-hearted travelers peeved that their already delayed flight was being further delayed by a 7-year-old boy with an allergic reaction.

The plane departed nearly two hours late.

Burton saw the story about the Alvarado family in her Facebook feed and felt like she was reading about a different flight than the one she was on Monday.

"It was talking about this kid and his family getting kicked off the airplane,'' she said. "I thought, 'I can't believe that they made a story like this out of that.' ''

Burton, a retired cafe owner from Bellingham, says she was sitting a few rows behind the family. She knew something was up when the plane wasn't taking off and flight attendants repeatedly talked to the family.

She watched the family get escorted off the plane. The boy's father, who the family says was diagnosed with terminal cancer in November, was carefully escorted down the aisle by a flight attendant and then put in a wheelchair, she said.

Father and son were wearing medical masks, she said.

When the family members got to the front of the plane, a handful of passengers at the back of the plane, six at most, started lightly applauding, she said.

"Have you ever been to a sporting event and somebody gets knocked down on the field and they get helped up and people cheer? That's how I took it,'' she said.

"I didn't take it as a negative at all. I just thought it was kind of applauding, cheering them on, happy you're getting help. Not, "Yay, get these people off the plane so I could get on with our lives.''

'Momentarily startled'

VanderYacht, who is from Lynden, Wash., and was sitting a few rows in front of the family, said she was momentarily startled by the applause.

"I thought it was kind of strange,'' she said.

She didn't think that it was mean spirited, though, and noted that the clapping was limited and not loud.

"I thought it was more like, 'Good, we're going to take off,' that type of thing. I didn't think it was anything against them, like 'Hurray, hurray, you're off the plane.' "

"I think if it were me and it was all happening to me, I wouldn't have made a big deal of this,'' VanderYacht said.

Asked whether the airline has evidence, anecdotal or otherwise, that passengers clapped when the family left the plane, and if so why, an Allegiant spokesperson said, "We cannot confirm that.''

A third passenger contacted by The Republic backed up the family's version of events.

Facebook post sparks outrage

Fabian, the 42-year-old Goodyear mom whose Facebook post about her family's incident on Allegiant sparked widespread media coverage,  said the family could hear the clapping from the front of the plane.

She also said there were snarky comments from nearby passengers, first when the airline moved them away from a dog thought to have triggered 7-year-old Giovanni Fabian's allergic reaction and later when Allegiant's medical experts decided they should not take that flight.

She said the couple, who together have 12 children, four of them adopted, are "honest, upright people.''

"I absolutely do not think that we overreacted at all,'' she said, adding that she never claimed they were booted off the plane as many headlines proclaimed.

"I just think (sharing the story) holds people accountable for their behavior.''

Other passengers back claims

Fabian said other passengers have come forward to back up the family's claims about rude fellow passengers.

Cheryl Lindsey, who flew to Mesa on Allegiant to visit her parents, said several passengers were huffing, puffing and sighing that the family's ordeal was delaying take-off. When the family was escorted off the plane, she said, the clapping was loud and malicious and stretched from the back of the plane to the middle, where she was sitting near the family.

The nurse from British Columbia, Canada, said she got up and said to some of the complaining passengers: "Each and every one of you are extremely inhumane.''  She said the flight crew appeared to be more concerned about accommodating the many dogs on the plane than the family.

"I wanted to cry for them,'' Lindsey said. "I am in (the father's) shoes. I have cancer. I have a child (now 24) with life-threatening allergies.''

In the Facebook comments on one news story, Chrystin Gabryshak of Bellingham said she was on the flight and was "horrified and deeply saddened'' by some passengers' behavior.

"Worst display of human compassion I have ever seen,'' she wrote. "I do have to applaud the one lone passenger who stood up and addressed those cheering with a "that's not right.''

Fundraising effort

She posted a link to the family's GiveForward fundraising page for Jorge Alvarado's cancer fight and said her family would be donating.

Fabian said the family has not asked for any money and noted that the account was created "way before'' the Allegiant flight. She said they received $50 vouchers from Allegiant and are not seeking anything else.

Disneyland trip

Southwest Airlines said Thursday that it will treat the family to a Disneyland vacation. Like the Bellingham trip, Fabian said, Disney is on her husband's bucket list.

Fabian and Alvarado, 48, also were in the news in January, when the Hilton Garden Inn in Avondale threw them a wedding after learning of Alvarado's cancer. Fabian said the hotel donated the space and the food and the couple paid for all other wedding expenses.

The viral coverage of the Allegiant incident began after Fabian detailed it on her Facebook page early Tuesday morning. She used to live in Washington so she sent the post to King 5, the NBC affiliate in Seattle. They interviewed the family for a story and it was picked up around the world.

The Facebook post in its entirety

"This evening I witnessed disgusting behavior from the passengers of Allegiant flight 171 Bellingham to Phoenix/Mesa,'' the post began. "My 7 yr old son had an allergic reaction to the dogs on the flight. We are not sure why he had this type of reaction but we assume that it has something to do with the immense amount of stress that he has been under lately. He has been forced to helplessly witness terminal cancer ravish through his father's body.''

She said her son will never forget how the passengers clapped as he got off the plane.

"Thank you for your insulting, ignorant, insinuating comments that minimized my son's experience, and make a horrible memory at the end of my husband's life. Shame on you for being so cruel. What would you have done if he had stayed silent and died in that flight? To the old lady flight attendant w short curly brown hair, you should have NEVER hastily smirked and made the comment that dogs are on every flight! Your comments are untruthful and unwarranted. We frequently fly and we have been on several flights with no animals and he has never had this type of reaction on any of the other flights that we have been on. Instead of diffusing the situation you added insult to injury and perpetuated the attitudes of the other passengers. Thankfully, the rest of the Allegiant staff were great. We have been forced to spend hundreds of dollars on unexpected expenses and have to try to figure out how to reschedule this weeks chemo treatments. Disappointment is an understatement!"

Allegiant has said little about the incident beyond prepared statements.

"Allegiant has been in direct contact with this family and have offered them our sincere apologies with regard to their negative experience on February 22, 2016. We are truly sorry for the unfortunate circumstances surrounding their planned itinerary and for the inconvenience they have experienced as a result. Additionally, we have forwarded the family's feedback on to the appropriate teams within the company to ensure any necessary service improvements will be made,'' the airline said Thursday.

Allegiant said in cases where passengers become ill or experience other medical issues, the airline consults with contracted doctors and others on how to proceed.

"In this case, the medical doctor recommended that the passenger should not travel at that time to ensure the highest level of safety for that passenger,'' the airline said.

The family was rebooked on an Allegiant flight on Wednesday.

Fabian said the family has moved on.

"That's over and done with and we forgive everybody that did that,'' she said.

She hopes the experience gives people more empathy.

"Nobody knows what other people are going through,'' she said.