A man named Wicliff Yves Fleurizard was arrested in Salt Lake City for boarding a Delta Air Lines flight to Texas without a ticket. He managed to get on the plane by taking a photo of another passenger’s boarding pass while they were distracted, according to court documents. Once on the plane, he claimed his seat was taken and was eventually caught by flight attendants, causing the plane to return to the gate.
Fleurizard told authorities that he was trying to get back home to see his family after a snowboarding trip in Utah. He admitted to using a Southwest Airlines “buddy pass” given to him by a friend in an attempt to fly out, but all the flights were full. Despite being screened by security at the airport without any issues, Fleurizard’s actions raised concerns about security breaches at airports, with the FBI launching an investigation into the incident.
This incident is not an isolated one, as there have been several cases in recent months where individuals have managed to board flights without a ticket. From a woman flying from Nashville to Los Angeles without a ticket to a man making it through security with only foreign identification cards in Denmark, these incidents highlight potential vulnerabilities in airport security systems both in the United States and abroad. Delta Air Lines has stated that they are cooperating with authorities to investigate the situation.