Ron Chenoy-USA TODAY Sports
The atmosphere on airplanes that ferry professional sports teams from one place to another tends to be a bit more relaxed than your typical commercial flight. However, there are still plenty of rules that both the passengers and the crew are required to follow, and two pilots were fired after a coach for the Colorado Rockies managed to infiltrate the cabin during a trip to Toronto.
If you were a kid who took a flight before 9/11, there’s a chance you were one of the lucky travelers who were invited into the cockpit to watch the pilots do their thing. However, that practice has been severely frowned upon for close to 25 years, as those attacks led to commercial airlines going to great lengths to restrict access to an airplane’s controls.
In 2023, the FAA instituted a mandate that will require newly-built commercial planes to be equipped with a “secondary barrier” in the flight deck for situations when the main cabin door is opened, which is designed to replace the food and beverage carts that have become the go-to security measure when a pilot needs to pop out for a bathroom break.
Crew members may be able to let their guard down when they’re working on a chartered flight filled with people who play and work for a professional sports franchise, but they’re required to abide by the same rules and regulations they’re expected to follow when overseeing a plane filled with random travelers.
However, they did not do that when the Rockies headed up to Canada for a game against the Blue Jays a couple of years ago, and a pilot is fighting for her job after a coach for the team filmed himself in the captain’s chair.
United Airlines fired two pilots after the hitting coach for the Rockies infiltrated the cockpit during a charter flight
The Detroit Tigers are the only MLB team that has access to a privately-owned plane, as the rest of the league relies on charter flights with major commercial airlines to get around.
On April 10, 2024, the Rockies headed to Denver International Airport to hop on a United Airlines flight that took them to Toronto for a three-game series with the Blue Jays. During the journey, Hensley Meulens, who served as a hitting coach at the time, was filmed sitting in the captain’s chair, and he sparked an FAA investigation after posting the video on social media.
The Colorado Rockies are under federal investigation after hitting coach Hensley Muelens posted this video in the cockpit of the team’s flight
“We are deeply disturbed by what we see in that video.” -United Airlines spokesperson
(via @chrisvanderveen) pic.twitter.com/4lqcuQyPuz
— Jomboy Media (@JomboyMedia) April 19, 2024
According to retired pilot Katherine Petit, the seat Meulens sat in had been vacated by captain Cynthia Clifford, who was made aware of what happened after returning from a trip to the bathroom. After landing, she filed a report with the airline’s Flight Safety Action Program, which is positioned as a whistleblowing avenue designed to promote transparency and shield pilots from punishment.
While she was initially cleared by the Event Review Committee, the FAA reportedly replaced its representative on that board with another one who objected to the ruling while claiming her report was invalid because alcohol was involved (that policy usually only applies to situations where a pilot was intoxicated, but the governing body argued it was triggered because Meulens was served onboard).
Clifford was ultimately fired along with the first officer on the flight, who theoretically should have prevented Meulens from sitting in her seat given his presence in the cockpit at the time. That decision has caused a bit of a stir in the aviation community, which is keeping an eye on the ongoing hearing where Clifford is appealing her dismissal (which is slated to wrap up on May 21st).
If you’re curious, Meulens was fired by the Rockies after the team got off to a 3-15 start in 2025, but it does not appear he was disciplined by the team or the FAA over the video that sparked this saga.