Craving passenger lights cigarette on delayed Spirit Airlines flight

Thank you for not smoking: Cigarettes have been banned on US flights for 20 years. Photo / Unsplash

A frustrated passenger on a Spirit Airlines sparked up a cigarette after a one-hour hold up on the tarmac delayed her craving. Chaos ensued.

The incident at Florida's Fort Lauderdale airport Tuesday was recorded by fellow passenger Alexa Majdalawi who was left fuming.

"She literally took out a cigarette and just started smoking," Majdalawi, an asthmatic, told Fox News. "I said, 'Is this real life?'"

The service from Detroit to Florida had been stuck waiting for a gate to free up after arrival.

Sat directly behind the passenger, Majdalawi said her initial flight had been cancelled and the delay on the tarmac had left everyone tetchy.

"She's smoking it in my face," she said. "She's turning around to blow it."

Initially the cabin crew did not know what to do. Still held up from approach to the gate, they offered her to move to an empty seat at the back of the plane.

From there she began filming the confrontation.

Finally Ft Lauderdale airport police were brought on to the plane to remove the passenger and her luggage - causing further delay.

Mortified, the offending passenger pretends to be asleep as the police search for her carry on.

"She hasn't got a bag, she's just messing with you," other passengers can be heard saying.

Smoking on planes has been banned in the US since 2000. Bylaws had stopped passengers on shorter, domestic flights from sparking up since 1988.

In 2016, the FAA closed a loophole that allowed vaping and smoking e-cigarettes on planes. However most airlines already had included bans in their own terms of service.
As a fire risk vaping devices are required to be taken as hand luggage, putting them temptingly within reach.

Majdalawi said she was surprised at how young the passenger looked.

"This has been banned for a long time," she asked. "What decade do you live in?"

A spokesperson for the airline said attendants took appropriate action given the circumstances.

"Flight Attendants noticed the odour and the other Guests were quick to point out who was responsible and hand over what remained of the extinguished cigarette," the airline said in a statement. "Our crew summoned law enforcement officers to have them waiting at the gate to remove the passenger."

Broward County Sheriff's Office said the cigarette craving passenger was compliant, and no arrest was made.