Airline Wouldn't Let Disabled Man Board. He Found a Way

'I just had to ignore them ... or I could not go back to Osaka': Hideto Kijima
By Newser Editors and Wire Services
Posted Jun 29, 2017 9:30 AM CDT
Disabled Man: Airline Made Me Drag Myself Up Stairs to Board
Hideto Kijima of Japan speaks to the media in Osaka on Wednesday.   (Yuki Sato)

A Japanese airline has apologized for making a wheelchair user hoist himself up a staircase from the tarmac to board his flight. Hideto Kijima faced the problem earlier this month while returning to Osaka from the southern island of Amami with friends, the AP reports. Vanilla Air, the budget affiliate of Japanese carrier All Nippon Airways, told him before boarding on June 5 that the small airport requires the use of stairs and has no lift to safely carry a disabled person onto the plane. Vanilla also refused to let his friends carry him. Kijima, 44, who's paralyzed from the waist down, wrote on his blog that he got out of the wheelchair, resisted airline staff who tried to stop him, and hoisted himself up the stairs with his arms, a process that took several minutes.

"I just had to ignore them and keep moving up, or I could not go back to Osaka," he wrote. One of his friends helped push him, and at the top he was put into a wheelchair and taken to his seat. "I've never thought I would be refused to fly for not being able to walk. It's a human rights violation," he continued. "We apologized to him for the unpleasant experience," says a rep for Vanilla, which says it will install new lifts. The rep says Amami is currently the only airport on Vanilla's 14 international and domestic routes without lifts for wheelchair users. Kijima, an advocate of barrier-free traveling, says he has visited 158 countries and used 200 airports and has never been rejected before. He says he isn't asking for fancy equipment but simply some assistance. Japanese media reported on his ordeal on Wednesday. (More All Nippon Airways stories.)

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