Men involved in Jetstar brawl may be forced to pay costs

THE six men involved in a wild brawl on a Jetstar from Sydney to Phuket had been refused alcohol by aircrew before the fight broke out.

SIX men involved in a wild brawl on a Jetstar flight from Sydney to Phuket may be forced to pay thousands of dollars for disrupting the flight and forcing its diversion to Bali.

Jetstar is understood to be considering whether to seek costs for the diversion, which could total more than $100,000, according to one aviation expert.

And it wouldn’t be the first time disruptive passengers have been forced to literally pay the price for their midair antics — both Jetstar and Qantas have previously sought costs from unruly flyers or banned them from flying for up to 10 years.

Passengers on flight JQ27 on Wednesday night described children screaming and “blood everywhere” as the six men became engaged in a punch-up mid-flight, forcing the captain to divert the plane to Bali.

The six men — Bradley Beecham, Brett Eldridge, Mark Rossiter, Lynmin Waharai, Ricky William and Michael Matthews — were taken into custody and questioned by Bali police. They were expected to return to Australia on a Jetstar flight today.

The men told Indonesian authorities they were drunk and airport officials at Bali have said alcohol caused the midair incident.

The Australian men taken off a Jetstar flight in detention at Denpasar airport in Bali.

Jetstar could not confirm whether the men were served alcohol on the plane, but said crew made the decision to refuse the service of alcohol to the passengers during the flight.

In a separate statement, Jetstar said the six men “were being extremely disruptive among themselves and refused requests from our crew”, prompting the captain’s decision to land in Bali.

The men will not face criminal charges in Indonesia because they were travelling on an Australian-flagged carrier. News Corp understands the Australian Federal Police is not investigating the incident.

Aviation expert Neil Hansford told news.com.au the incident would have cost Jetstar in the

“hundreds of thousands of dollars”.

“This was a Boeing 878 and to redirect an aircraft like that, it costs fuel, operating costs, all the costs of the landing and handling at Denpasar (airport); you’ve got passengers who were kept waiting for at least two hours in Phuket to come back and they were very fortunate the airline was able to return within the curfew,” he said.

In 2012, a drunken passenger that caused a diversion on a Qantas flight between Sydney and Japan cost the airline $120,000.

These costs are frequently passed onto offending passengers. Last month, an unruly passenger who threw a mobile phone at a flight attendant on a 2015 JetBlue flight from Fort Lauderdale to Los Angeles, forcing its diversion to New Orleans, was forced to pay $9650 to the airline to cover the cost of fuel, landing and other costs associated with the unscheduled landing.

One of the men are removed from the Jetstar flight after it arrived in Bali.

‘THERE WAS BLOOD EVERYWHERE’

Some 300 other passengers were on board Wednesday night’s flight from Sydney to Phuket.

Sydney woman Romy Papas, 22, said she was sitting in the same row of seats as the men and believed two of the six were the main combatants.

Ms Papas, who said she had been in tears for most of the incident, said the man who provoked the fight had been obnoxious and tried to pick a fight with an unknown man who had asked him to stop bothering other passengers.

The provocateur was then punched several times in the face by his mate, in an apparent attempt to calm him down.

“He hit him in the face three times or so … there was blood everywhere, it was all over his chest and he was wiping it on the seats and there was bloody napkins everywhere,” Ms Papas said.

The men were captured on camera drinking in Sydney before boarding the flight to Thailand. Picture: Channel 7

Ms Paps said the fight broke out about four hours into the flight but the men had been rowdy and obnoxious “from the get-go”.

She said the men had stood up and leant over her seat, while some directed vulgar remarks at the crew. The pilot or co-pilot had spoken to them several times before the fight broke out.

Ms Papas praised Jetstar crew for handling the situation well.

But one of the group, Brett Eldridge, 32, took to Facebook to deny the “altercation” scared passengers.

“One of our group had an altercation so they took all six off the flight,” he wrote.

“Yes one guy had altercation on flight and they kicked all us off a gun point wtf is wrong with this world lol. We are being taken back to Australia on the news they said a brawl etc (sic) passengers were scared no such thing.”