'My wife was slumped forward': Man slams Qantas for reaction to medical episode

A Qantas passenger has slammed the airline after he was left infuriated with the response from “incompetent” cabin crew when his wife fell ill during a flight.

Sam Hooper voiced his concerns on Twitter on Monday after his wife became unresponsive mid-flight en route to Brisbane from Auckland last month.

Mr Hooper says he flagged for the attention of flight attendants when his wife appeared to be struggling to breathe, but was left in dismay with their lack of urgency in the matter.

He claims crew eventually “sauntered” to him and his wife after chatting among themselves at the back of the plane.

“At this point I didn’t know whether she had fainted, had a seizure or something worse,” he recalled.

“My wife was slumped forward, unconscious, leaning on the passenger in the window seat.”

Mr Hooper was thankful for the help of a nearby doctor who ordered an attendant to bring her oxygen. But the concerned husband was further enraged when staff tried to make his “barely conscious” wife sit upright during landing.

“The flight attendants then insisted that my wife sit with her tray table up and her seat in the upright position for landing. I’m no medic, but that struck me as f****** stupid,” he wrote.

Mr Hooper claims his ordeal only worsened when they landed, with staff failing to recognise the severity of the situation.

“Qantas flight attendants made us WAIT until every other passenger had disembarked at their leisure and toddled off the airplane before my wife and I could leave,” he said.

“Remember, at this point we had no idea what was wrong or how serious her condition was.”

Mr Hooper was thankful to be eventually placed in the “competent hands” of the Qantas ground crew who called an ambulance and offloaded their baggage when realising they wouldn’t be making their connection to Los Angeles.

But the damage had already been done and Mr Hooper said crew members had “recklessly and negligently endangered the safety” of his wife.

He claims their actions made a “stressful and potentially life-threatening situation even more dangerous and worrisome through incompetent, negligent behaviour and inability to follow basic protocol.”

He says they were further delayed as they were made to clear immigration before his wife could be transferred to hospital.

But a Qantas spokesperson told Yahoo7 News in a statement that their hands were tied and it is a legal requirement to cooperate with border control regardless of the situation.

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“As the couple were transferring from one international flight to another, they were required to clear customs and immigration in Brisbane and our ground crew facilitated this as quickly as possible,” they said.

They also said it is a “requirement for all passengers to be seated upright for take off and landing”.

The spokesperson said the airline understood Mr Hooper’s concern but are glad to hear his wife has made a full recovery.

“Our customer care have apologised if Mr Hooper felt that the standard of care was not up to his expectation”, they said, noting their “cabin crew are trained to handle all types of situations onboard”.

Mr Hooper says he only went public with his complaint after Qantas initially failed to offer an apology, stating “they don’t care about upset passengers, just as they don’t care about passengers who fall ill on their planes.”