Southwest Airlines has garnered a lot of attention in the past few years for booting passengers for being "too fat to fly."
"Clerks" director Kevin Smith had a famous tiff with the airline after he was booted from an Oakland to Burbank flight in 2010. He then proceeded to lose 65 pounds. This summer, Kenlie Tiggeman was told she was "too fat to fly" and had a long confrontation with a Southwest employee over the airline's weight limits. (For the record, Southwest's "Customers of Size" policy clearly states passengers who cannot fit between the 17-inch armrests must purchase a second seat.)
Now the airline is enforcing its policy on its new subsidiary, AirTran. Starting in March 2012, AirTran will require an overweight passenger to purchase an extra seat if they can't sit in one seat with the armrest lowered, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports.
Peggy Howell, a spokeswoman for the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance, told the Journal-Constitution that she's "sorry to hear that they’re now going to be passing on their bad policy to another airline. We are paying customers."
Southwest responded that the policy affects "far less" than one-half of 1% of its customers, the paper reports.