Delta passenger is put on standby when she tries to get earlier flight. She gets a seat, but is then unceremoniously deboarded: ‘Walk of shame’

Getting involuntarily deplaned is never fun. However, the way it happened to Joy Flinchum on a recent Delta Airlines flight had her questioning her self-esteem for a moment. Especially since she hadn’t really been expecting to even be on the flight in the first place. Her confused Instagram post went on to rack up over 982K views as people tried to help her make sense of the situation. 

In her video, Flinchum is seated in the waiting area after being deplaned. She claimed, “I just got kicked off a flight. No joke. And before you think it’s anything, I wasn’t bad. I wasn’t belligerent. I wasn’t anything. Let me tell you the story. And I’m only telling you this story because I need to know if this has happened to anybody else. Because I am pretty embarrassed. Also kind of funny.” 

Flinchum explained she got done with work early, so she approached Delta to see if she could get on the earlier flight back home. “They said, ‘There’s no seats, but we can put you on standby.’” Flinchum was okay with it, since she still had her original seat. She stated, “So I go in. I wait at the gate. And I got a seat. And yay! I text my husband. I’m coming home. Yay!” It was the center seat in the last row, but she was just happy to “be headed home at a decent time.”

A matter of balance

“So I’m sitting there. Listening to my audiobook. Settling in. Everybody’s on the plane,” Flinchum recalled. “And all of a sudden I think, ‘Did I just hear them announce my name?’ They did announce my name. They said, ‘Push the call bell.’ So I did, and the gate agent walks all the way to the back of the plane.” This, Flinchum claimed, is where things get awkward. Although this is just her version of the story and it cannot be verified. 

The Instagrammer alleged, “I’m not lying. In front of god and everybody, she says, ‘Miss Flinchum, we have a weight balance problem. We need you to get off the plane.’ Like… what? She’s like, ‘You gotta get off.’ I’m like, ‘Just me?’ She’s like, ‘Yeah.’ And there was one other, like, Delta employee that got kicked off, but she’s obviously on standby.”

Flinchum was wildly embarrassed. She told her viewers, “So I have to do the walk of shame from the back of the plane to the front of the plane, with people probably thinking, ‘What that psychopath do?” 

She understood it; she just didn’t like it. As she noted in her caption, “Safety first, obviously. But when Delta declined to provide emotional restitution, L’Occitane and an unironic piece of cake saved the day. Please tell me: Has anyone else ever been removed from a plane after boarding because of a weight-and-balance issue?” One thing Flinchum will find mollifying is that the reason behind her deplaning is rooted in strict aviation safety protocols. 

According to Phoenix East Aviation, a pilot’s responsibilities go far beyond just navigating the aircraft. They must ensure the plane is within safe weight and balance limits before every single flight. This involves calculating the basic empty weight of the plane, which includes the aircraft itself and essential fluids, and adding the gross weight, which accounts for passengers, crew, cargo, and fuel. 

If a plane exceeds its maximum takeoff weight or maximum landing weight, it can lead to serious performance issues, such as requiring longer runways or suffering from reduced maneuverability. Even the center of gravity is critical. If it shifts too far, it can make the plane unstable. 

As the European Union Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) notes, airlines use standard average weights for passengers to make these calculations easier, but they must verify the actual load before takeoff. If the weight is higher than expected, airlines may have to remove passengers or cargo to maintain safety margins. Once, an American Airlines flight had to remove 41 people. 

Flinchum’s followers had plenty to say about the ordeal. One user commented, “I think they picked you not because of your weight (you don’t seem overweight to me) but because you were the person got on the flight at the last minute.” However, one man claimed he was literally removed for his weight.

Another user added, “Yep- It can happen. You were basically a standby passenger and can be pulled off for weights and balances reasons.” Some were even sympathetic to the awkwardness of the situation, with one person writing, “shame on the Delta employees for not handling the situation privately, and discreetly.”

Despite the frustration, Flinchum handled the situation with humor, treating herself to a snack after the ordeal.