• Passenger fired after allegedly using racial slur, hitting child during flight

    Kootenai County Sheriff, file

    Joe Hundley was charged with assault after allegedly hitting a 19-month-old boy who had started to cry aboard a Delta flight.

    By Alastair Jamieson, Staff writer, NBC News

    A man accused of uttering a racial slur and slapping another passenger's crying toddler during a flight has been fired in the wake of the alleged incident.

    Joe Hundley, 60, from Hayden, Idaho, was charged with assault after he allegedly hit the 19-month-old boy who had started to cry during the airplane’s descent, NBC station KARE reported.

    According to court documents, the child’s mother Jessica Bennett alleges Hundley leaned over and said, "Shut that [N-word] baby up!" before slapping the child. This caused him to bleed and cry even harder, his mother told KARE.

    'Offensive and disturbing'
    The Boise Weekly reported that Bennett's story was supported by another passenger who was aboard the Delta Air Lines flight from Minneapolis to Atlanta on Feb. 8. That could not be independently confirmed by NBC News.

    Hundley is no longer working for Idaho-based aircraft component manufacturer, Unitech, its parent company AGC Aerospace and Defense said in a statement on its website Sunday:

    “Reports of the recent behavior of one of our business unit executives while on personal travel are offensive and disturbing. We have taken this matter very seriously and worked diligently to examine it since learning of the matter on Friday afternoon. As of Sunday, the executive is no longer employed with the company.

    “We wish to emphasize that the behavior that has been described is contradictory to our values, embarrassing and does not in any way reflect the patriotic character of the men and women of diverse backgrounds who work tirelessly in our business.”

    In an interview with KARE, Bennett said Hundley appeared intoxicated, accusing him of becoming increasingly obnoxious during the flight.

    "He reeked of alcohol," Bennett said.  "He was belligerent and I was uncomfortable."

    Hundley's attorney, Marcia Shein of Atlanta, has said that her client will plead not guilty to the charge.

    Shein told Reuters that she has received hate mail over her defense of Hundley, but added that she believes her client has been misunderstood.

    "He is not a racist," Shein said. "I'm going to make that real clear because that's what people are suggesting."

    "There's background information people don't know about, and in time it will come out," she said.

    The Spokesman-Review newspaper of Spokane, Wash., reported that Hundley had denied the allegations.

    “I can only say it’s an absolute falsehood,” the Spokesman-Review quoted Hundley as saying. 

     

  • Delta 737 rolls off taxiway into embankment at Atlanta airport; no passengers on board

    The airline is investigating after the plane's brakes failed at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. NBC's Brian Williams reports.

    By NBC News and msnbc.com

    ATLANTA -- No one was injured when a Delta plane rolled off a taxiway and into an embankment at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport Tuesday morning.


    Two Delta maintenance workers were testing the engines on the 737 aircraft shortly after 5 a.m. when the brakes failed and the plane began to move, according to Delta spokesman Eric Torgenson.

    No passengers were aboard the plane when it left Taxiway E and crashed into the embankment. The plane sustained damage, but the extent of it is not yet known, Torgenson said.

    A runway adjacent to Taxiway E is closed while crews work to move the plane.

    According to the FAA, the incident has had no impact on operations at Hartsfield although it may do so later when Delta tries to recover the plane.

    NBC's Jay Blackman contributed to this report.

    More from Overhead Bin:

  • Head-on crash kills 3 sorority spring-breakers in Ohio

    By msnbc.com staff and news services

    BOWLING GREEN, Ohio -- A wrong-way driver slammed head-on Friday into a car full of sorority sisters who were caravanning to an airport for a spring break trip, killing three of the young women and the other driver.

    The car carrying the three Alpha Xi Delta members, ages 19 to 21, and two other sorority sisters hit the wrong-way vehicle overnight on a rise in Interstate 75 south of Toledo, just miles from Bowling Green State University, which they all attended. The two survivors were seriously injured.

    Sixteen sorority sisters were heading to the Detroit airport in different cars as they tried to make a 5:30 a.m. flight to the Dominican Republic, a friend said. Another vehicle carrying five of the students narrowly avoided the wrong-way driver, Ohio state troopers said.

    "I don't think the college girls ever saw it coming. Nothing they could have done to avoid the crash," Wood County Sheriff Mark Wasylyshyn said.

    The wrong-way driver, Winifred D. Lein, 69, of Perrysburg, Ohio, was traveling alone, authorities said. Investigators are looking into why she was driving on the wrong side of the divided highway.

    "The college girls apparently did nothing wrong," Wasylyshyn said.

    'Tragic news'
    Killed were Rebekah Blakkolb, 20, a junior from Aurora, Ohio; Christina Goyett, 19, a sophomore from Bay City, Mich., who was studying teacher education; and Sarah Hammond, 21, a junior from Yellow Springs, Ohio, majoring in apparel merchandising, the university said.

    “We’re shocked and deeply saddened by this tragic news,” BGSU President Mary Ellen Mazey told The Toledo Blade. “Our hearts go out to the families, friends and sorority sisters of these young women.”

    Goyett was excited about her first trip to the Dominican Republic, said Dee Bishop, a family friend in Bay City. She was a graduate of John Glenn High School, where she competed in swimming, and was studying English at Bowling Green.

    "She was an absolutely wonderful, positive, happy person," Bishop said.

    She had just visited with her family Thursday at a surprise birthday party for her mother, Robyn, at a Bay City restaurant, and driven back to the campus several hours to the south.

    Students dropped off flowers and held each other outside the sorority house in Bowling Green, a stately brick building with green shutters. Members of the sorority wouldn't speak to reporters.

    The injured were identified as Angelica Mormile, 19, a freshman from Garfield Heights, Ohio, and Kayla Somoles, 19, a sophomore from Cleveland. Bowling Green President Mary Ellen Mazey said in a Facebook post that they had serious injuries.

    Spring break begins Saturday.

    According to the Toldeo Blade, tapes obtained from the sheriff’s office showed at least four motorists called 911 just after 2:10 a.m. to report a car going south in the northbound lanes on I-75. Truckers had reported the wrong-way driver, and a state highway patrol officer had seen her car and begun a pursuit when the crash happened.

    Lein was cited in 2002 in Toledo Municipal Court for a lane changing violation, according to court records. A message was left at a phone listing for her.

    The accident recalled a similar tragedy 10 years ago, when six Bowling Green students were killed while returning home from a spring break trip to Florida.

    The students, all 19, were returning from Panama City, Fla., on March 15, 2002, when their minivan slid into oncoming traffic and was struck by a tractor-trailer.

    Authorities said severe winds and heavy rain may have contributed to the crash, which happened on Interstate 71 in Kentucky.

    The sorority sisters' death was the second school tragedy in five days in Ohio. Three students were fatally shot Monday and two others wounded at Chardon High School east of Cleveland. A 17-year-old was charged.

    The Associated Press contributed to this report.

    More content from msnbc.com and NBC News

  • Flight diverts to Fla. after 'unruly' couple seeks Champagne in first class

    By msnbc.com staff and news services

    A Delta Air Lines flight from Atlanta to Costa Rica was diverted to Tampa, Fla., on Sunday evening after a couple from Germany became unruly, officials said.

    Delta spokeswoman Chris Kelly Singley told The Associated Press Flight 414 departed Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport at 6 p.m. Sunday and landed at Tampa International Airport at 7:34 p.m. The captain made the call to land, the spokeswoman said. After the "unruly" passengers were removed, the plane went on to Costa Rica, she said.

    Tampa International Airport spokeswoman Janet Zink identified the passengers as Peter and Gabriele Strohmaier of Dusseldorf, Germany. She said they were seated in first class and demanding food and Champagne and refused to sit down.

    Zink said no charges had been filled. The FBI and Transportation Security Administration were investigating.

    Reached at the Tampa hotel where the couple was spending Sunday night, Gabriele Strohmaier told The Associated Press that a Delta crew member "exaggerated enormously and felt terribly insulted" after her husband raised concerns about the food and beverage service.

    She said her husband had asked for a glass of champagne, but was told it was all gone. She said the crew member then walked away rather than listen to his concerns. She denied that she or her husband was told to sit down and refused.

    "No, we were not standing," she said.

    Peter Strohmaier, who identified himself as a lawyer, said he "did nothing except to say I would like to have the meal and so on...all normal things."

    He said the Delta crew member told him she was not pleased with his attitude.

    "I am not prepared to accept such behavior," he said, adding that in the end he didn't get Champagne, a meal or even water. The couple had flown to the U.S. from Germany earlier in the day.

    Gabriele Strohmaier said the couple need to "take another airline, naturally not Delta" to get to Costa Rica.

    The Tampa Bay Times reported that flight 413 was on the ground for about an hour before continuing on to Costa Rica.

    More content from msnbc.com and NBC News:

    The Associated Press and msnbc.com staff contributed to this report.