A woman who fractured her ankle during a seatbelt mishap while on a JetBlue flight en route to the Bahamas has sued the airline for failing to provide adequate medical attention. Long Island resident Maria Mistretta was flying with her husband to the Bahamas from John F. Kennedy International Airport on July 23, 2022, when she accidentally injured her ankle while on the flight.
Lawsuit documents obtained by The Independent claim that Mistretta got up from her seat and stepped into the aisle when her foot "became entangled in a hanging seatbelt, or other object causing her to fall backwards”. “As she fell backwards, plaintiff’s foot twisted and cracked, and [Mistretta] landed on her back with her foot still tangled in the low hanging object,” the documents added. After the incident, Mistretta and her husband, Salvatore Mistretta, allege they asked the flight crew for a first aid kit and some ice, but were told by members of the crew that “everything was packed up” and “inaccessible” for the remainder of the flight, the suit says.
The lawsuit also claimed that the crew told the couple they would need to wait for all other passengers to disembark the aircraft before they could, but at the point they were allowed off, the airline could only provide a “broken” wheelchair that lacked proper support for her legs. The couple claims in the court documents that once they landed at their destination in Nassau, JetBlue personnel advised against calling an ambulance an.