BBC journalist crawls to toilet mid-flight after airline denies wheelchair access
A BBC journalist was left dishonored after being forced to crawl to the toilet during a LOT Polish Airlines flight from Poland to London, as the airline refused to provide an onboard wheelchair. Frank Gardner, BBC's security correspondent, shared his experience on X (formerly Twitter), calling out the airline's policy, which he described as discriminatory against disabled passengers.
Gardner, who has been paralyzed for over 20 years following a shooting by Al-Qaeda gunmen in Saudi Arabia, expressed his frustration in a post. "Wow. It’s 2024 and I’ve just had to crawl along the floor of this LOT Polish airline to get to the toilet... as ‘we don’t have onboard wheelchairs. It’s airline policy.’ If you’re disabled and can’t walk, this is just discriminatory," he wrote, alongside a photo of himself sitting on the plane’s floor.
In a detailed account on the BBC, Gardner explained that the ordeal was both physically uncomfortable and degrading. "It was humiliating to shuffle along the floor of an aircraft in front of other passengers in my suit," he said, adding that LOT Polish Airlines informed him it was not their policy to provide onboard aisle chairs. He criticized the airline for not accommodating disabled passengers, pointing out that such devices are compact and can easily be stored on planes.
Gardner mentioned that he had never faced a similar issue with any other airline and found it astonishing that in 2024, an airline could operate in and out of British airports with a policy that essentially implied disabled passengers unable to walk were not allowed to use the toilet during the flight.
Although Gardner was critical of the airline, he defended the cabin crew, stating that they were as helpful and apologetic as possible. He acknowledged that the situation was not their fault but a result of the airline’s policy, and mentioned that he would refrain from flying with LOT Polish Airlines until they "join the 21st century."
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At least 11 killed, dozens injured in Israeli strikes in Beirut as diplomats push for cease-fire
Beirut (Lebanon), Nov 23: Israeli airstrikes on Saturday killed at least 11 people and injured dozens in central Beirut, officials said, as diplomats scrambled to broker a cease-fire.
Lebanon's Health Ministry said the death toll could rise as emergency responders dug through the rubble looking for survivors. DNA tests are being used to identify the victims, it said, adding that 63 people were wounded. The strikes were the fourth in the Lebanese capital in less than a week.
The escalation comes after US envoy Amos Hochstein traveled to the region this week in an attempt to broker a cease-fire deal to end the more than 13 months of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, which has erupted into full-on war in the past two months.
Israeli bombardment has killed more than 3,500 people in Lebanon and wounded more than 15,000, according to the Lebanese Health Ministry. The fighting has displaced about 1.2 million, or a quarter of Lebanon's population. On the Israeli side, about 90 soldiers and nearly 50 civilians have been killed by rockets, drones and missiles in northern Israel and in fighting in Lebanon.
Israel's war with Hamas also shows no signs of abating. Gaza's health ministry said at least 80 people were killed between Thursday and Friday in multiple strikes in the enclave's north, including the Kamal Adwan and Al-Ahli hospitals. Dozens of people are still trapped under the rubble, it said.
