Flight attendant allegedly told mother to ‘glue’ mask to toddler’s face.
A Virginia Beach mother has claimed a Southwest Airlines flight attendant told her to “glue” a mask on to the face of her two-year-old daughter who was refusing to wear one.
Ali Cleek had boarded a Southwest flight from Orlando, Florida to Norfolk, Virginia, on August 12 with her husband and two children, 4 and 2.
Cleek said Drew, her 2-year-old, was crying and would not keep on her mask as the plane prepared for take-off.
In an Instagram post, Cleek said the only way her daughter knew how to calm herself was to suck her thumb, something “damn near impossible with a mask.”
“Drew is a thumb sucker and her only way she biologically knows how to soothe herself is by sucking her thumb which is damn near impossible with a mask,” Cleek said in the post.
“Well two flight attendants stood over me watching as we held her down and tried to get her to wear it.”
One of the flight attendants reportedly told Cleek sarcastically to either cut a hole in the mask or “glue it to her face.”
Cleek told Fox News that the flight attendant indicated she had glue available.
“I just know that regardless if it was sarcasm or not I was embarrassed and trying to follow the mandate as much as I could,” Ms Cleek was quoted as saying by the news station.
“My daughter is 2. We were doing everything we could to comply.”
In a statement emailed to Fox News, Southwest Airlines did not mention the specific incident, but said passengers “over the age of two” should “wear a mask at all times throughout the travel journey”.
“The federal mask mandate for travellers has been in effect since February 2 2021 and requires all passengers over the age of two to wear a mask at all times throughout the travel journey,” it read.
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