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A Texas man is accused of causing a security threat on a flight to Alaska.
He forcibly kissed a flght attendant who rejected an advance, court documents say.
Burk was arrested in Anchorage, but denied the accusations, the documents say.
A Texas man drank heavily on a flight from Minnesota to Alaska, tried to force himself on a flight attendant, and broke a plate containing the pilot’s meal, court documents say.
According to a probable-cause affidavit first obtained by The Daily Beast, on April 10, David Alan Burk became unruly on a flight from Minneapolis to Anchorage, Alaska.
It said the incident began when Burk was “snippy” with a flight attendant, identified as TC, when told there would not be time to serve him a pre-flight drink of red wine.
After take off, TC served Burk his drink, and when he later returned to pick up Burk’s meal tray Burk shook his hand, the affidavit says.
About 10 minutes later, according to the documents, Burk was on his way to the bathroom when he stopped in the galley where TC was.
Burk allegedly said: “Oh, you’re so beautiful.”
Here is how the a document describes what followed:
“T.C. smiled and politely said, ‘Thank you.’ BURK then asked, ‘Can I have a kiss?’ T.C. replied, ‘No, thank you’ to which BURK then said, ‘Okay, well on the neck then.’ While the plane was in flight, BURK then grabbed T.C.’s neck, pulling him toward BURK, and purposefully kissed T.C.’s neck. T.C. stated he was ‘very uncomfortable and caught off-guard’ by what BURK had just done.”
“T.C. stated that when BURK had kissed him, he felt uncomfortable, awkward, and thought, “What the hell just happened?” the documents allege.
The documents say that after the incident TC told other flight attendants about it, and said he didn’t want to be near Burk until he’d returned to his seat. When he saw Burk was seated, he went back to the front galley and was told by another flight attendant that Burk had broken a plate on a tray with the captain’s meal on it.
When TC delivered another meal to the captain, the pilot said that he had reported the incident to Delta, that law enforcement would be alerted, and it was classified as a “level 2 security threat.”
A female flight attendant who took over serving the first-class section told TC that Burk had 2 more glasses of wine, appeared “wasted”, and slept for the rest of the flight, the documents say.
When the plane landed, Burk was arrested.
In interviews with police, he claimed he had had one glass of wine after takeoff and then slept for the rest of the flight. He said he had not gone to the bathroom during the flight, and when asked if he had kissed TC said “[He] never kissed anybody.” He denied breaking the plate.
Burk refused to take a Breathalyzer test, but conceded he’d consumed alcohol before the flight, the documents say. Burk told police that he was in Alaska to administer the estate of a friend who had died.
Insider contacted Burk’s legal representative for comment but did not immediately hear back. Insider has also sought to contact Burk for comment on the allegations. He is due in court on April 27.
In recent years, there has been a surge in violent and other disruptive incidents on planes, with Federal Aviation Authority figures showing that 2,300 such incidents were recorded in 2022, and the highest ever number was recorded the previous year, with 5,981 incidents.