Marines come to the rescue after screaming passenger melts down on flight, barricades himself, makes threats

Three U.S. Marines are being hailed as heroes after tackling a hysterical plane passenger who barricaded himself inside the bathroom and began screaming threats.

What are the details?

According to a Thursday Daily Mail report, Capt. Daniel Kult, Sgt. John Dietrick, and Pvt. 1st Class Alexander Meinhardt were passengers aboard a Tokyo-to-Dallas flight on Monday when the fracas broke out.

The fracas quickly turned into a melee when the Marines were forced to extricate the screaming passenger from the bathroom and tie him to a seat with cable ties.

The flight was diverted to Los Angeles International Airport, and from there, the frenzied passenger was taken to a local hospital for observation.

Dietrick, who hails from Virginia, said, "While watching a movie during my flight from Japan to Texas, I started to hear screaming coming from the restroom on board. When I took off my headphones, I heard a man sounding very distraught and screaming from the bathroom."

Dietrick, who was traveling with his fellow Marines, alerted them to the incident, and the three gathered outside the on-board restroom to assist. A flight attendant unlocked the door, and the men seized the passenger, restrained him, and tied him to a seat using cable ties.

Meinhardt, who is from Wisconsin, said that he knew he had to step in when the passenger "became a danger to others and himself."

"I didn't think twice about helping restrain him through the rest of the flight," he added.

Kult, from Iowa, said that Marine training served the men well during the frightening incident.

"We just assessed the situation and acted," he said. "Working with the flight crew, we got the door open, and from there, worked together to subdue [the unruly passenger]. We didn't take time to talk it over. We just got ready and did what we needed to help."

What else?

In a statement to Stars and Stripes, Dietrick said, "We all heard the commotion and instinctively knew something needed to be done. The only thing that was going through our heads was to ensure the safety of all passengers on board and our fellow Marines."

A spokesperson for the LAX police said that the Marines did a "great job."

The Marines' battalion commander, Lt. Col. Chris Niedziocha said that Kult, Dietrick, and Meinhardt are "men of action."

"Honestly, I'm not surprised," Niedziocha said of their actions.

The incident is under investigation by the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Central District of California's and Los Angeles' Federal Bureau of Investigation.

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