A China Southern flight attendant was removed as a passenger from AirAsia flight 7809. She was traveling from Chongqing, China to Kuala Lumpur. The 2 a.m. departure on an Airbus A330 was delayed around an hour and a half on Wednesday after she complained that another customer stopped her from using her phone and filmed her.

She wanted the video deleted and an apology. A crewmember responded to her in English, and she became angrier. She complained that someone working an international flight from China should speak Chinese.

Ground staff repeatedly tried to calm her, told her her conduct was unlawful, and urged her to step off to resolve the matter peacefully on the ground. She refused, demanded compensation, and said that if the airline did not resolve it on the spot, nobody would be flying.

Police boarded the aircraft, told other passengers to stop filming, and led the woman offer. She asked the passenger who recorded her to send her the clip as evidence. Sometimes recording her is ok I guess?

The flight attendant whose interaction with her escalated her behavior says he does not speak Mandarin, asked a Mandarin-speaking purser for help, and the captain decided to turn the plane around to have her removed.

“讲中文‼️” (speak Chinese‼️)

The 🇨🇳 woman demanded a non-Chinese flight attendant speak Chinese (Mandarin) on AirAsia’s D7809 Chongqing to Kuala Lumpur flight on Apr 22 when the flight attendant politely asked her to lower her voice cuz she’s talking too loud on the phone after… https://t.co/u0OduLz4H0 pic.twitter.com/yDyOnQVMPr

— Byron Wan (@Byron_Wan) April 22, 2026

The self-identified China Southern flight attendant at the center of the controversy is wrong that Mandarin speaking is mandatory on the flight.

This is a Malaysian airline. Malaysia’s rules require flight attendants to be able to speak Malay and English.
Generally the international approach is that airlines use their home country’s language and English.
On international flights, airlines should consider the official languages of the departure and destination countries and the languages of passengers likely on board. So Mandarin is desireable to accommodate here, and they did have a Mandarin speaker, but not all announcements and crew are expected to accommodate Mandarin.

There are stupid legally-enforceable language rights onboard (stupid only because they are legally-enforceable), passengers do sometimes get banned for filming flight attendants and they refuse to get off their phone during the safety briefing.

Sassing a flight attendant during the briefing is ill-advised! Even if they are refusing to make announcements in the required language.

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