Finding out your pilot was just arrested for DUI, moments before you were set to take off, isn't news any airline passenger wants to hear, yet here we have the story of Southwest Airlines Flight 3772. A source tells NBC News that a TSA officer at Savannah/Hilton Head International Airport in Georgia smelled booze on 52-year-old pilot David Allsop and informed law enforcement, who proceeded to board the plane before it took off for its early morning flight to Chicago and remove him from the aircraft.
"We felt [the plane] moving away, and then it just stopped," passenger Robert Newmerch tells WTOC. "I saw a police officer enter the plane and then go into the cockpit, then got off the plane, then a few minutes later came back and the pilot left with him." Per the FAA, pilots obviously aren't allowed to drink while they're flying the plane, but they're also not allowed to have consumed alcohol within eight hours of piloting a flight, or if their BAC is 0.04% or higher. "We're aware of a situation involving an employee on Flight 3772 this morning from Savannah," the airline said in a brief statement, noting that Allsop had been "removed from duty" and that customers on the plane were booked on other flights.
Newmerch, however, ended up canceling his trip altogether. "To see that and know that that was why I did not fly to Midway this morning left a pit in my stomach," he tells WTOC. "I'm already iffy about flying. I don't travel too often, but this is going to change the way I travel." He added: "I can't get onto a plane without taking my shoes off—how is any [pilot] getting on with any alcohol in his system whatsoever?" Records from the Chatham County Sheriff's Office indicate Allsop was charged with driving under the influence and was released on a $3,500 bond, per CBS News. (More Southwest Airlines stories.)
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