United Airlines Killed The Most Pets Last Year

I think it's safe to say, from a PR point of view, United Airlines has had a shocker of a week. A video of a paying passenger being forcibly removed from one of their flights earlier this week resulted in millions being knocked off its share price, after thousands turned to social media to express their disbelief and disgust at how he was treated.

A second man came forward to say he had previously been threatened with handcuffs, after paying for a first-class ticket, because the flight had been oversold.

Now it's been revealed that more pets died on-board United Airline flights than any other major US airline in 2016. Jesus.

Data released last week showed that nine pets died and 14 more were injured last year, in total 109,149 were transported with United. Amongst those who died were an American Staffordshire Terrier called Winston and a Yorkshire Terrier named Diamond - most of the deaths appeared to be of dogs, however one cat also died.

A passenger filmed this in 2013. Credit: NBC

By comparison Delta had five pet deaths and five injuries (from 81,070 pets transported) and Alaska Airlines had two deaths and one injury (after transporting 112,281 pets). You can check out the full statistics from the Department of Transportation here.

Business Insider did the stats on those figures and found that United's track record for pet deaths and/or injuries is around .02 percent, whereas Delta's is .01 percent - so it's still pretty safe to fly with your pet.

A spokesperson told Business Insider: "We have some of the best facilities for taking care of customer pets.

"We keep customers informed and consider pets customers as well because we understand pets are part of our customers' family."

Despite this people on Twitter are not impressed:

Back in 2012 model Maggie Rizer flew her two Golden Retriever on a United flight from New York to San Francisco. She told the LA Times, when she went to pick up her pooches, a member of staff 'casually greeted' her with the news, 'one of them is dead'. It was since discovered the dog had died of heatstroke.

At the time United issued a statement to say that the dog had been kept in a temperature controlled environment the entire way.

Featured Image Credit: PA

Claire Reid

Claire is a journalist at LADbible who, after dossing around for a few years, went to Liverpool John Moores University. She graduated with a degree in Journalism and a whole load of debt. When not writing words in exchange for money she is usually at home watching serial killer documentaries surrounded by cats. You can contact Claire at [email protected]

@ClaireReid19