Passenger spots employee putting tape on the wing of a plane before takeoff
A passenger on board a Spirit Airlines flight has sworn off flying with them again after she saw someone sticking tape to the engine before takeoff.
There's just something about a whole bunch of people climbing inside a giant metal bee which is powered by the liquid corpses of plankton and flying up into the sky which makes some people nervous.
Even the most frequent flyers would probably prefer to have their feet on solid ground as often as possible, and they definitely wouldn't want to look out of the plane window and see someone applying tape to the wing.
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That's what happened to TikToker @myhoneysmacks when she was setting off from Nashville International Airport and decided to take a look at what was going on outside.
Quickly wishing she hadn't, the TikToker got a good look at a member of the ground crew applying sticky tape to the plane.
"The reason why I don’t fly with Spirit." She said, posting the video to her TikTok account where over 1.6 million people have seen it.
"I don’t care if it is aviation airplane tape or nothing, the fact that you have to tape the plane together and then you doing it while people are on the flight like we cannot see you."
"That’s the reason why I will not fly with Spirit, now Southwest I’ll do, but Spirit no sir."
She was really not happy to be flying in a plane which seemingly needed some tape applied before takeoff, wondering what would happen when they were up in the air.
She said: "After a while, they’re going to need a fresh new roll of tape, their tapes gonna lose all its stickiness, you flying all around the world and you got tape holding it together. Don’t even worry about it, I won’t be booking with you."
People flocked to the comments to discuss this with some reassuring her that the adhesive, known as Speed Tape, was a 'completely normal' tool among pretty much all airlines and singling one of them out wasn't going to help.
It's a highly durable type of aluminum tape which can withstand 600mph winds and the sorts of extreme conditions a plane might find itself flying through, with mechanics having to 'routinely have to apply it after each flight'.
It's used for a lot of minor repair jobs, if the engines were about to fall off of the plane's wings you can bet they'd be using something a little tougher than tape.
Others commenters weren't willing to take their chances, asking the TikToker 'why are you still sitting on the plane'.
UNILAD have contacted Spirit Airlines for comment.
Joe Harker