Carews Upset by Incident on Airplane

Former Angel Rod Carew said Sunday that he is undecided whether to file harassment charges against an airline attendant over a disagreement on a flight from Minneapolis to Orange County last week.

“The guy was just rude,” Carew said of the attendant, whom he and his wife, Marilynn, encountered during the flight home from the funeral of their daughter, Michelle, who died of leukemia on April 17.

According to Carew and a Northwest Airlines spokesman, the disagreement arose over the proper storage of a large picture of Michelle that the Carews were carrying. Fearing that it would be damaged, the family requested that it be stored in a forward compartment, but the attendant refused and stored it in an overhead bin.

“He put it up there in the compartment and was about ready to put a bag on top of it when I stopped him,” said Carew, a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame. “He laid it down flat.”

According to an airline spokesman, the attendant--who has an exemplary record and has received several passenger commendations--did nothing improper.

“The bin the Carews wanted it stored in was full and the flight attendant thought it would be better protected overhead where there was less baggage,” said Northwest Airlines spokesman Jon Austin.

Nonetheless, he said, the president of the airline personally called the Carews to discuss the matter and apologize.