United Airlines Settles With Passenger Who Was Dragged From Plane

Dragged passenger reaches settlement with United  2 Hours Ago | 01:37

United Airlines has settled with Dr. David Dao after he was dragged off a flight earlier this month.

As part of the deal, the settlement amount remains confidential.

Earlier Thursday, United unveiled a slew of policy changes that it hopes will prevent a repeat of the public relations disaster that has engulfed the company after Dao was forcibly removed from a plane on April 9.

Dao was a passenger on Flight 3411 from Chicago to Louisville, which was overbooked. He and other passengers were offered $800 to give up their seats for United crew members.

The airline said it will now offer up to $10,000 to customers who volunteer to give up their seats on an overbooked flight.

Social media erupted in fury after videos and photos of the incident circulated. CEO Oscar Munoz drew fire when he used the euphemism "re-accommodate" in a public statement to describe what happened to Dao.

Munoz did not improve the situation when he said Dao was "disruptive and belligerent" in an email to employees. He has since changed his tune and repeatedly apologized for how the airline handled the situation.

United should be applauded "for this acceptance of corporate accountability," said Thomas Demetrio, one of Dao's lawyers.

The United incident began when four of the airline’s crew members needed to get from Chicago to Louisville to work another flight the following morning. When no one volunteered to give up a seat in exchange for an $800 travel credit and accommodations for meals and hotels, the company’s automated system selected Dao, his wife and two other passengers to be bumped.

A Vietnam-born, Louisville-area physician, Dao insisted he needed to see patients the next day and refused to vacate his seat. Various United officials intervened in a futile attempt to persuade him, then contacted airport authorities for assistance with his removal.

Dao, who had boarded the Louisville, Kentucky-bound flight at Chicago’s O’Hare International Airport, sustained a concussion, broken nose and lost two teeth during his forcible removal by police employed by the city’s Department of Aviation, according to his lawyers.

The ensuing viral video-fueled controversy was the start of a spate of bad publicity for the United Continental Holdings Inc. unit. It continued this week with the death of a giant rabbit. Amid the fallout from the April 9 Dao incident, the company’s board canceled Chief Executive Officer Oscar Munoz’s expected 2018 elevation to chairman.