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5 lessons we can take away from the Delta flight that crashed upside down on the runway

1) Always obey seat belt instructions.

Photo credit: YYZBrennan

A Delta flight from Minneapolis flipped over and caught fire upon landing in Toronto.

Flying has often been touted as one of the safest modes of transportation, but after a rash of aviation accidents in February of 2025, people are starting to have questions. What the heck is happening in the friendly skies? Why is there a sudden uptick in plane crashes? Is flying still safe?

One of the weirdest aviation incidents we've seen is the Delta flight that flipped upside down upon landing in Toronto on February 17, knocking off a wing and catching fire as it skidded to a stop on the tarmac. The 76 passengers on the commuter plane found themselves hanging upside down in the cabin as flight attendants raced to get everyone out of the plan quickly and safely. Miraculously, no one was killed, and though 21 injured passengers were initially transported to the hospital, 19 have been released as of February 19.

The thought of having your airplane do a 180-degree roll on the runway and having to exit a burning aircraft from a bat-like position is sheer nightmare fuel, but there are some important lessons we can all learn from how this incident played out.

1. Always obey seat belt instructions—"low and tight across your lap"

If you fly with any regularity at all, chances are you zone out during the pre-takeoff safety instructions, but this accident definitely has us all at least thinking about our seat belt compliance. Imagine how easy it would be to slip out of the seat belt hanging upside down if it weren't buckled low and tight.

There's a reason the seat belt sign exists. If footage of extreme turbulence isn't enough to rattle you into always staying buckled when the light is on, this crash likely will.

2. Respect your flight attendants

Flight attendants sometimes have to deal with difficult or rude passengers, which is unfortunate, especially since those same passengers rely on flight attendants to do their jobs in an emergency to ensure their safety. Flight attendants don't get to freak out when a plane crashes—they have to tap right into their emergency evacuation training.

But in this case, there was no specific training for this specific scenario because who would imagine it ever happening? But those flight attendants were able to improvise and get the passengers on board out of their upside down positions, out the exits and onto the tarmac within seconds of the crash happening. This is a good reminder that even though flying is usually smooth and without incident, flight attendants are primarily there for our safety, not servers there at our beck and call.

3. Regulations in aircraft design help keep us safe

One of the reasons this crash went the way it did is because of the way the plane was designed and made. From the way the wing broke off without tearing apart the fuselage (the body of the plane) to the way the seats remained in tact and firmly planted despite being upside down with people in them, the aviation engineers behind the building of this aircraft—as well as the regulations in place that require more safety features—deserve some kudos.

“Everything that could go wrong went wrong, yet 80 people survived the accident,” said David Soucie, a CNN safety analyst and former FAA safety inspector who credited better plane design, improved safety and stronger, more secure seats for the survival rate.

"Even the design of the seat back or the tray table is all part of how we consider making that survivable space," Graham Braithwaite, professor of safety and accident investigation at the UK's Cranfield University, told the BBC. "And the seatbelt that people have is so important - that is the ultimate thing that stops people being thrown around the cabin like this."

4. People are pretty awesome, actually

Reports from people who were on the flight indicate that the passengers helped one another out and were generally awesome in an incredibly harrowing situation.

One man shared that he and the woman sitting next to him, who hadn't spoken to each other the entire flight, gave one another a long hug after getting out of their seats. "It was nice to see people working together, as in like no one held anyone back from getting off the plane or getting out of their seat, or whatever," he said. "No one was like, 'I need to be first!'"

Working together with the crew to evacuate smoothly may have saved lives, as he reported there was an explosion a few minutes after everyone got off the plane. Phew.

"The most powerful part of today was, there was just people. No countries, no nothing," another passenger said. "There was just people together helping each other." Beautiful.

5. Flying is still dramatically safer than driving

Even with the wave of plane incidents we've seen included, flying is still statistically safer than driving in a car. People are understandably nervous about flying right now, but that's the impact of mass media coverage. If we saw news stories and headlines about every car accident in the country every day, we'd be freaking out about driving cars, but we don't see those. Accidents happen in aviation, but usually only the major commercial plane incidents make national or international news.

If we look just as the numbers, January of 2025 was actually a record low month of airplane accidents nationwide. Not to downplay what's been happening in February, but we've really become accustomed to extreme safety when it comes to flying. The past 15 years have seen the lowest airplane fatalities than any other 15-year period ever, so we should probably wait to freak out too much over the seemingly anomalous accident rate of the past two weeks.

At least that's what I'm telling myself before I hop on my next flight.

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Man praised for refusing to switch seats with a dad who was traveling alone with his daughter

He made the right decision.

Photo credit: Canva

Man praised for not switching seats with dad traveling with daughter

Airlines charge for everything but breathing nowadays so people tend to be protective of their seat assignments. They picked them with their own hands with their needs and preferences in mind before paying the extra money to confirm the seating. Choosing your own seat can range from $5-$80 extra per ticket depending on where in the cabin you choose to sit, barring first class options.

It's for this reason that people aren't keen on trading their seats with someone who chose to let the airline auto-assign a seat for them. This doesn't stop people from asking unsuspecting fellow travelers to swap seats with them, likely relying on the social pressure of the situation to coax a yes. But one man refused to be swayed, even when the other passenger points out that he would like to sit next to his minor daughter which may have been enough to encourage others to oblige the request.

The passenger who was being asked to move had already paid additional money to sit in an aisle seat he explains, "I always book an aisle seat. My company allows me to add the small surcharge for an aisle seat (it was $18). I sat early and this guy comes with his daughter. His daughter had the middle seat next to me. He had another middle seat elsewhere. He asked to switch with me. I said I would if he had an aisle seat. He said he has a middle seat."

Season 9 Ugh GIF by Curb Your EnthusiasmGiphy

The middle seat is typically the least desirable seat due to being stuck between two other passengers, no designated armrest and nothing to comfortably lean your head on should you fall asleep. Waking up only to realize you've been asleep on a stranger's shoulder can make for an awkward interaction, so there's no surprise the man didn't want to trade seats with the dad on those details alone. But the man didn't choose the aisle seat because he was afraid of drooling on the shoulder of a fellow passenger.

"I said sorry, I am a big guy (6 feet, 260+ pounds), I am [un]comfortable in middle seat. It's a 4.5 hour flight," the befuddled passenger shares before adding. "I explained I am physically uncomfortable in the middle. The aisle gives me more room."

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One might think the interaction would end there but it didn't. According to the six-foot-tall man, the dad then involved a flight attendant to encourage him to give up his seat so the dad could sit next to his child. But the man continued to refuse the dad's request which resulted in the dad having to sit in his original seat and the teenage girl being seated next to the original man. He had no desire to be uncomfortable for a fairly long flight and while he was expecting for people to disagree with his actions, they were overwhelmingly on his side.

"You paid extra for that aisle seat, and it’s your comfort on a long flight. The guy should've booked better seats if he wanted to sit next to his daughter. Plus, it’s not your job to accommodate his poor planning," one person writes.

No Way Beer GIF by BuschGiphy

"If you want to sit together, pay for the seats. Good for you, people like that need to learn they cant have their cake and eat it too," someone else says.

"I hate it when a FA asks you to move one you've already said no. They should stand by their company who sold you the seat and reiterate that to the person asking," another chimes in.

pushing air travel GIFGiphy

"I’ve been in the situation traveling, when my kids were small and flights were canceled, etc. that we were seated separately. When you REALLY do NEED compassion, people are generally OK with it and they are understanding and will likely move if able. I’ve also raised my kids to be independent and as teenagers they would have been just fine. In a case where it really is a need (like a special needs teen), the airline owes its passengers some sort of a solution like upgrading an inconvenienced traveller," someone else adds.

The man does admit that maybe the dad assumed the solo traveler would be inappropriate with his daughter saying, "Maybe he thought I was some creeper? I AM NOT. I popped a prescription muscle relaxer, put on relaxing music on my earphones and zoned out." In the end the man did not give up his seat and the teen girl and her father were both fine sitting in the seats assigned to them.

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'Entitled parent' discovers airline moved their toddler's seat just before flight takes off

Another passenger behaving badly story takes a huge twist.

Photo by Steven Thompson on Unsplash

I took a long Amtrak train trip from Atlanta to Baltimore with my 9-year-old daughter this summer. As far as I could tell, there was no way to reserve specific seats in coach on our particular train ahead of time. But we arrived as early as we could and, to our delight, were treated to a near empty train. We sat together in a two-person row and had a really nice trip up to Baltimore.

On the way back? We boarded at Union Station and the train, having arrived from New York, was already packed. The conductor told me he would try his best to seat us together but couldn't guarantee it. You should have seen the terror in my daughter's eyes. It would be a 14-hour overnight train ride. Sitting her next to some stranger that whole time? Absolutely not. No way.

They eventually found us seats across an aisle from each other, which kind of worked, but wasn't ideal. Luckily, the guy I was supposed to sit next on the other side flew into a rage that he wouldn't have a row to himself and stormed off to sit elsewhere, freeing up the row for us.

But for a few horrible minutes, I had become "that dad" desperately asking anyone in the area if they'd be willing to move so we could sit together.

I had become the dreaded entitled parent from all the viral travel stories.

Stories of "entitled parents" desperately trying to get other passengers to switch seats go viral all the time. But a recent thread on Reddit shows why we don't always get the full story.

Description from Reddit of airplane seating snafuReddit

User u/takeme2themtns recently shared a nightmare travel story in the r/Delta subreddit:

"In typical Delta fashion, they just switched up our seats and placed my toddler in a row away from us," they wrote. "Booked three seats ... in comfort plus months ago. Now, several hours before the flight we get notifications that our seats have changed. They put wife and me in exit row seats and the toddler in a window seat a row away."

With no way to fix the seating snafu digitally, the OP would have to rely on the Gate Attendant or even Flight Attendant to make a last-minute change — which would force someone else on the plane to move.

"I’m confident the GA (gate attendant) will take care of it," they wrote, "but it’s still so frustrating that we have to worry about it. I know we see posts like this all the time, but that’s because it happens all the time to people. Delta needs to fix this trashy system."

Another user in the comments wrote to share a similar story:

"I had this happen to me. The check-in person said to talk to the gate.

The gate said to talk to the flight attendant.

The flight attendant told me to ask people to trade seats.

I asked people. People said no. Other passengers started berating me for not planning ahead and saying my lack of planning isn’t their responsibility.

I defended myself by saying I reserved seats months ago and Delta moved me at the last minute. Then passengers started yelling at each other about my situation.

The FA had someone move and I got to sit with my daughter."

The user noted that the situation was chaotic and traumatizing.

These stories are far from rare.


woman carrying baby while sitting on gray seat Photo by Paul Hanaoka on Unsplash

I found another story just like this from a few months ago on the r/United subreddit. The user's family booked seats together only for the system to separate them right before the flight, leaving an 8-year-old to fly seated alone. The flight crew's only solution was to ask other passengers to switch, causing the OP's family to get lots of dirty looks for the duration of the flight.

Having a young child or toddler seated away from you while traveling is just a complete No-Go, for many reasons. But as a dad, leaving a kid of nearly any age to sit alone — even if they're 8 or 10 or 14 — is not acceptable.

It's not just about convenience, it's a huge safety issue. There are plenty of horrifying news stories that support why a parent would do absolutely anything to avoid it.

When we hear these stories, they're almost always framed as the parents being unprepared, lazy, and entitled. But maybe we're missing the point.

boy sitting on plane seat while viewing window Photo by Hanson Lu on Unsplash

A story from January of this year praises a passenger who refused to switch seats with an "entitled dad" as a "hero."

People are fed up with parents asking them to switch out of airline or train seats that they paid good money for. And I don't blame them!

But we need to stop beating each other up and start holding the airlines and other travel companies accountability for putting parents and non-parents into this mess in the first place.

There needs to be a better system for families booking plane and train tickets. When you buy tickets, you have to enter in the ages of the children you're traveling with — so it stands to reason that these mix-ups flat out shouldn't happen!

Families shouldn't have to panic at the gate or on board about this! Other paying passengers shouldn't have to give up their seats!

The good news is that the Department of Transportation has recently gotten involved with a dashboard of which airlines guarantee family seating at no additional cost.

The DOT is looking to even make it illegal to for airlines to charge parents and children fees to sit together. Parents and children under 13 would be required to be seated side by side or immediately adjacent, and if not, they'd get a full refund or free rebooking — it's known as the Families Fly Together Act.

Traveling in 2024 is stressful enough, from seat changes to unruly passengers to high numbers of cancelled flights.

Seating kids and parents together seems like one small problem we should be able to solve.


This article originally appeared in September.

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Flight attendant sits on the floor the entire flight to comfort distressed passenger

“He explained every sound and bump.”

Courtesy of Molly Simonson Lee

Flight attendant sits on floor to comfort passenger

Not everyone enjoys flying. The level of non-enjoyment can range from mild discomfort to full blown Aerophobia, which is defined as an extreme fear of flying. While flying is the quickest way to get to far away destinations, for some people being that far off the ground is terrifying and they'd rather take their chances on the ground.

A passenger flying from Charlotte-Douglas International Airport in North Carolina to JFK International Airport in New York confronted that fear while flying with Delta. The woman, who is currently still unidentified expressed that she was nervous to fly according to Molly Simonson Lee, a passenger seated behind the woman who witnessed the encounter. Tight spaces don't make for much privacy, but in this case, the world is better for knowing this took place.


According to Lee, who posted about the exchange on Facebook, the Delta flight attendant, Floyd Dean-Shannon, took his time to give the nervous traveler his undivided attention. Lee told Upworthy the unidentified passenger, "was very nervous and even before the plane took off, she was visibly shaken by each sound."

Approximately 25 million people in the United States have Aerophobia according to the Clevland Clinic and most of them probably wish Dean-Shannon was on their flights. "He took notice and began explaining what each [sound] was, with the warmest, calmest tone," Lee said. That wasn't even the most amazingly sweet part of the story.

While the explanation of noises helped, Lee said about halfway through the flight the passenger was fighting back tears, which prompted Dean-Shannon to sit on the floor and hold the frightened passenger's hand. He comforted her for the rest of the flight while sitting on the floor. "His tone was so kind and soothing," according to Lee.

Dean-Shannon's kindness didn't stop there. Lee explained, "the woman next to me was celebrating a birthday and he sang to her and made her a 'cake' with all of the goodies he could round up."

I'm not sure what Delta pays him but he needs a raise immediately and it seems the people of the interwebs agree.

Commenter, Miranda Anderson, tagged Delta Airlines and wrote, "I hope you see this! These are the types of people that deserve raises and make your company worth flying with. This is what pits [sic] you above the others so show these employees this is what you want and what you need."

"I love this. This is what society is lacking. Empathy and kindness towards people in time[s] of need" wrote Diane Lawrence.

While Mary Beth Acker Ford, said, "I was on a flight with him today. He exudes joy and is intentional about making a connection with each person!"

This level of engagement with passengers is not a common experience but clearly people are happy to see this type of connection between humans. Flying anywhere can be stressful for any amount of reasons. From leaving the house late and having to participate in an involuntary 5k to catch your flight, to making your way through the devil's backyard, also known as Atlanta International Airport...just for them to change your gate 10 minutes before boarding.

So having a flight attendant like Dean-Shannon is just the breath of fresh air people need. "The way he's looking at her...letting her know she's safe!!! This is just one of the many reasons I will always fly Delta Air Lines," Liz Martin wrote in the comments.

"It was obvious he is just a good, kind soul who shares that generously with everyone he encounters. Such kindness is rare and a true gift when encountered," Lee remarked. That level of kindness is rare indeed and we sure are happy someone thought to capture it.


This article originally appeared on 01.19.23

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