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<\/figure>\n\n\n\nA new rule proposed by the U.S. Department of Transportation\nwould permit airlines to stop accepting emotional support animals on\nplanes allowing only service dogs that are professionally trained to\nperform tasks or assist passengers with disabilities, including psychiatric\ndisorders.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’m all for this as airplanes have started looking like\nNoah’s Ark or flying zoos. Who wants to ride on an airplane with\nbirds, cats, pigs and whatever anyone imagines to be their emotional support\ncreature? Maybe you do. A lot of us do not. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
This has developed into a lot malarkey over the years.\nCarole and I were traveling back from Maine several years ago. We had bought\ntickets well in advance so we could have the two front bulkhead seats. This was\na small plane and our seats weren’t considered first class, but we had thee or\nfour more inches of leg room. Before boarding our flight, we heard our names\ncalled on the airport public address system. We went to the check-in counter\nand were almost told that we needed to give up our seats for a man with a\ndisability and his wife who had service animals. We were young, na\u00efve and\ngullible so being tenderhearted people we said okay. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
The agent assigned us to the two seats directly behind our\nold seats which meant no extra leg room that we had planned for months in\nadvance. The guy gets on the plane and he and his wife appear healthier than we\nare. He was wearing a hearing aid, but he was seeing and getting around fine as\nwas his wife. With these people were “three” dogs. Yes, three dogs!\nThe only thing I could tell that these dogs could do was stink up the area\nwhere we were sitting. To add insult to injury we had to ride now behind our\noriginal seats with these dogs occasionally starring at us. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
I’m not doing it again. Many years ago, I developed a blood\nclot from extended travel and I’m not giving up my seat for some person who\nneeds to sit and pet their dog. I’m not an animal hater. I love animals. I had\na dog in my house for sixteen years. For people who truly are disabled and need\na documented trained service dog then that’s okay but plan and buy your ticket\nin advance instead of bumping someone else out of their seat for your\n“dogs.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Most real trained service dogs are better behaved than\nsome passengers. It’s just finally time that our airlines can get some control\nover the zoos flying through the sky. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Dr. Glenn Mollette Groundhog Punxsutawney Phil is coming out soon to see or not see his shadow on his big day, in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania. If old’ furry Phil wants to fly first… <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":45842,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45841"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/8"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=45841"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45841\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/45842"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=45841"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=45841"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thelehighacresgazette.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=45841"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}