Emotional support animals strike again.
Today’s ESA drama comes compliments of a Southwest Airlines flight from Phoenix to Portland, where a girl was apparently bitten by another passenger’s emotional support dog. Southwest’s crack PR team said the injury occurred when the dog’s teeth “scraped a child’s forehead as the young passenger approached the animal.” Sounds like victim blaming to me, but in response to the incident, Southwest has said the airline will review its policies on emotional support animals.
ESAs have recently made headlines after Delta and United Airlines announced earlier this year that they will require ESAs to have additional documentation before they are allowed to accompany passengers. In recent years, the number of people bringing ESAs onto flights has exploded as passengers discovered that if you call your pet an ESA, airlines are required by the Air Carrier Access Act of 1986 to let it fly for free. However, unlike trained service animals, ESAs don’t have to have any specific training—nor do they even have to be dogs. ESAs have included turkeys, sugar gliders, snakes, spiders, miniature ponies, and, recently, a hampster than a bereft passenger flushed down an airport toilet when she was told it wasn’t allowed on her Spirit Airlines flight.
In Phoenix, the girl who scraped her face against a dog’s teeth was examined by emergency medical workers and cleared to fly. The emotional support biter and its owner stayed behind.
