Dubai: Middle Eastern carriers seized on the social media storm surrounding the forced removal of a passenger from a United Airlines flight to hit back at one of the arch-critics of their breakneck expansion.
Emirates mocked United’s best-known advertising slogan on its Twitter account, urging passengers to “fly the friendly skies with a real airline.”
Royal Jordanian Airlines joined in with a pun on the man being dragged from the plane, while Turkish Airlines pointed out that it last week added an extra passenger to one of its flights after a baby was born on board.
While most airlines steered clear of commenting on the United debacle, the US giant’s embarrassment over the removal of the man to make way for one of its employees was too good an opportunity to miss for Mideast operators subject to years of gibes over the part played by state funding in their success story.
The Emirates tweet includes a video mocking United Chief Executive Officer Oscar Munoz’s suggestion this year that Gulf carriers “aren’t real airlines” by highlighting its TripAdvisor ranking as the world’s best carrier in 2017. The post ends with the punchline: “Fly the friendly skies ... this time for real.”
The world’s biggest long-haul airline has taken a swipe at US rivals before, most notably in a 2015 ad campaign that showed Jennifer Aniston being offered peanuts and a hand towel by American-accented flight attendants, before waking to find herself cosseted in the flatbed seat of an Emirates superjumbo.
Royal Jordanian’s anti-United tweet shows a picture of a no-smoking sign on one of its aircraft along with the message: “We would like to remind you that drags on our flights are strictly prohibited by passengers — and crew.”
Turkish Air, like Royal Jordanian impacted by the recent US laptops ban, re-tweeted a message from Huffington Post founder Arianna Huffington commenting: “Instead of involuntarily removing a passenger, Turkish Air assists in involuntarily adding one.” That’s after a girl was born last Friday on the carrier’s flight between Guinea and Burkina Faso.
