@meltingmagnolia: I know this isn’t my usual art content, but it’s important. I recently had my chair damaged by American Airlines on my very first time flying as a wheelchair user. My chair actually made it “safely” inside the cabin in the priority closet thanks to my & my husband’s persistance with the gate agents on every single leg of our trip, and yet it still got damaged because a flight attendant felt his bags were more important than my mobility aid. He tossed my carefully placed wheels out of the closet (I could hear them clatter to the ground from 12 rows back) to stuff his bags in there. As a result, when the plane landed 4 hours later, I found them scratched, bent, & they wobbled while wheeling. My damage was nowhere near as catastrophic as many wheelchair users experience. And thankfully AA replaced my wheels rather quickly, but this shouldn’t happen. These instances should be very rare, and yet they’re not. The carelessness, lack of respect, and lack of education or training in the airline industry when it comes to disabled passengers & their mobility aids is astounding. We need change. *Video & images of actual airline wheelchair damage from articles across the web* #WheelchairUser #WheelchairLife #AccessibilityMatters #AccessibleTravel

Savannah Magnolia

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Region: US

Sunday 15 September 2024 16:09:18 GMT