Ryanair may face action over blind passenger complaints

NO-FRILLS airline Ryanair may face legal action for allegedly discriminating against blind passengers, a British charity said yesterday.

The Royal National Institute for the Blind (RNIB) said it had received eight complaints about the way the company dealt with passengers with sight difficulties, but could find no record of complaints about any other airline.

A spokesperson said RNIB lawyers were considering legal action on the basis that Ryanair’s online booking system discriminated against blind people.

“The system appears to discriminate against disabled people by not allowing them to book online and therefore qualify for discounts,” the spokesperson said.

The RNIB raised its concerns after a group of nine blind and partially sighted people complained of being ordered off a Ryanair flight from Stansted to Italy a few weeks ago.

A spokesperson for Ryanair said the decision to offload the nine passengers was in accordance with safety procedures which limits the number of disabled/mobility impaired passengers to four per flight. She said the limit was originally agreed with Britain’s Disability Rights Commission for safety reasons.

“This is so our crew can attend to these passengers individually in the case of emergency evacuations,” the spokesperson said.

She said the only reason the nine blind and partially sighted passengers were asked to travel on a later flight was because they did not notify the airline of their disability at the time of booking and there were already three disabled passengers on the flight.

The National Council of the Blind of Ireland (NCBI) claimed the justification the pilot used for ejecting these passengers was in case of smoke in the cabin.

“But who would be more able to get off the aircraft in the dark than blind people?” said Des Kenny, NCBI’s chief executive.

The NCBI intends to send a written complaint to Ryanair.

One of the blind passengers taken off the flight said yesterday that the airline had made the group feel like “second-class citizens”.

Beryl Barton, from Norwich, who is in her mid-60s, was travelling with her husband Jim, 58, who is almost completely blind. They were among the party of 11, which included three fully sighted and three partially sighted people.

“We couldn’t understand it. They said they already had four disabled people on the plane and told us ‘we have got to take the whole group off’. It was very humiliating. We were made to feel like second-class citizens. I will never fly with Ryanair again,” she said.