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Flight ‘Karen’ smokes cigarette on Spirit Airlines plane, says ‘it's been a long day’

'Only on a spirit flight: girl lit up an actual cigarette on the plane in her chair,' wrote user Alexa Majdalawi who posted a video of the incident

An unidentified White woman was labeled a 'Karen' after a TikTok video of her smoking a cigarette on a Spirit Airlines flight went viral. The video ends with her being arrested. The clip with a caption said, “Only on a spirit flight: girl lit up an actual cigarette on the plane in her chair. Here’s her getting arrested,” was shared on the social media platform by user Alexa Majdalawi or @heyalexa_nah. As of Sunday, August 29, the video has attracted around 11 million views and thousands of comments.

The footage also showed other flight passengers looking shocked while a Black woman called for security to come and take the Karen away. “Come get her please, bro, because she’s holding us up. Someone call 911, please get her. She’s fucking up our flight,” she screamed. In the US, smoking inside a flight has been prohibited since 2000. After another passenger’s yelling, two security guards came to take Karen away, while she pretended to be sleeping.

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The Black passenger continued to yell, but it appeared that a bodyguard got annoyed because of that. He pulled his face mask down and told the woman, “I know you don’t believe this but we can actually do this without your assistance, so just hold on OK?” The guards then took Karen with them. However, viewers were upset that the guard snapped at the Black woman. A person commented, “He gave more attitude to the person who didn’t light a cigarette on a plane…” The second one added: “I love how the cop is still ruder to the Black lady than the white one who broke federal law.”

Meanwhile, another TikTok video of the same incident from a different user, showed Majdalawi trying to stop the woman when she lit up her cigarette. Majdalawi tells her, “Um, can you not smoke cigarettes right now?” The White woman responded: “It’s been a long day.” Later, Majdalawi shared another lengthy TikTok video about her experience. She told the viewers that the incident happened after the flight landed, but passengers were still inside as another plane had to leave its gate. It was at that time that the Karen decided she needed a smoke. A flight attendant saw this but did not call her out, forcing Majdalawi to confront the White woman and request her to put down the cigarette — but to no avail. But when another flight attendant came near her, Majdalawi asked her if she could shift to the back because she was not able to take in the smell and the smoke of the cigarette. She also added that she is asthmatic and didn’t want to end up using her inhaler on a plane while covering her face amid the coronavirus pandemic. 

However, when the flight attendant asked Karen if she was guilty of doing the criminal act, she denied it, which resulted in everyone around her calling her out and slamming her behavior. “This is like the craziest flight story I’ve ever had in my whole life,” Majdalawi added. She also said that she won’t take Spirit Airlines in the future ever again.