{"id":20115,"date":"2020-02-19T18:45:47","date_gmt":"2020-02-19T18:45:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/cmshub.wpengine.com\/?p=303255"},"modified":"2024-11-03T15:16:50","modified_gmt":"2024-11-03T15:16:50","slug":"airline-wont-let-dad-and-newborn-on-plane-so-kind-stranger-takes-them-home","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/airline-wont-let-dad-and-newborn-on-plane-so-kind-stranger-takes-them-home\/","title":{"rendered":"Airline Won\u2019t Let Dad And Newborn On Plane, So Kind Stranger Takes Them Home"},"content":{"rendered":"

Airlines have different policies<\/a> when it comes to minimum age requirements to fly. Some airlines allow newborns to fly at just two days old. Others require that babies be at least two weeks<\/em> old.<\/span>Rubin Swift was unaware of this potential issue. When he went to check in to a Frontier Airlines flight in Phoenix, Arizona, with his four-day-old baby girl, Ru-Andria, he was told he couldn\u2019t board. He didn\u2019t have proof of her age, and he wouldn\u2019t be able to get her birth certificate for several more days. His daughter needed to be seven days old to fly, per airline policy<\/a>.<\/span>Swift, 43, had learned he had a newborn daughter<\/a> at the same time he was told he was going to have full custody of her. Even though it had been a surprise, he didn\u2019t hesitate. He immediately went to Phoenix to get his daughter and bring her home to Cleveland, Ohio.<\/span>\"\"<\/span>Photo: YouTube\/Inside Edition<\/span>
\n<\/span>After he picked up his daughter, he planned to head straight back home to Cleveland. He didn\u2019t have extra money or a place to stay in Phoenix.<\/span>When the airline told him he wouldn\u2019t be able to fly home that day, he asked for a refund for the ticket, hoping to use that money to help him and his daughter get through the next few days away from home.<\/span>\"\"<\/span>Photo: YouTube\/Inside Edition<\/span>But the airline told him he wouldn\u2019t get his money refunded for seven days.<\/span>\u201cI was out of money and the hospital told me that I wouldn\u2019t be able to get a birth certificate for seven days,\u201d Swift said<\/a>. \u201cI was worried that if security saw me sleeping at the airport with a newborn, they\u2019d take her away from me and charge me with neglect. I was stuck.\u201d<\/span>
\n<\/span>\"\"<\/span>Photo: YouTube\/Inside Edition<\/span>Swift has three grown children from a previous marriage as well as four stepchildren with his wife, Tiffany. After the airline denied him the flight, he called his wife<\/a> and they talked about their options, but there weren\u2019t many. They didn\u2019t have the money for him to rent a car or to stay in a hotel room for several days.<\/span>Swift thought of the one person he had connected with during his time in Phoenix: Joy Ringhofer, a volunteer at Banner University Medical Center where Ru-Andria had been born. He\u2019d met her in the NICU, where Ru-Andria had been transferred as a precautionary measure<\/a>.<\/span>\"\"<\/span>Photo: YouTube\/Inside Edition<\/span>
\n<\/span>Swift and Ringhofer had bonded in the NICU. Swift had told her about the new, unexpected situation he was in, and she could see he was already a sweet and devoted father to his child. Ringhofer had offered to take Swift and Ru-Andria to the airport, and gave him her number in case he needed anything.<\/span>So Swift reached out to Ringhofer, 78, after he was denied seats on the plane, not knowing who else to call.<\/span>\u201cI didn\u2019t expect her to say the things she said\u2026 \u2018I\u2019m coming to get you, and gonna take you home,\u2019\u201d Swift said<\/a>. \u201cSo I\u2019m thinking she is gonna drive me back to Cleveland, but she actually brought me to her house, feeding me and making sure my baby is all right.\u201d<\/span>\"\"<\/span>Photo: YouTube\/Inside Edition<\/span>
\n<\/span>They stayed together for a few days at Ringhofer\u2019s home, until Swift and Ru-Andria could get home. They went on walks together, went grocery shopping, and even visited Ringhofer\u2019s late husband\u2019s grave.<\/span>\u201cI\u2019m black and she is white. I\u2019m a stranger who grew up in the projects in the Bronx and she\u2019s a great-grandmother who recently lost her husband,\u201d Swift said<\/a>. \u201cShe knew very little about me, and yet, she took me in. Color wasn\u2019t an issue to her. She showed me that in this crazy world, there is still compassion.\u201d<\/span>\"\"<\/span>Photo: YouTube\/Inside Edition<\/span>Swift says that he will always refer to Ringhofer as Ru-Andria\u2019s grandmother.<\/span>
\n<\/span>\u201cI could see the pain in her face from losing her husband, so at the cemetery, as we sat there with the baby, I said, \u2018Hey, Charles, look \u2014 it\u2019s your new granddaughter,\u2019\u201d Swift said<\/a>. \u201cWe had some touching and wonderful moments. I lost my mom to cancer in 2007, so Joy really became like a mother or grandmother figure to me.\u201d<\/span>\"\"<\/span>Photo: YouTube\/Inside Edition<\/span>Ringhofer is just smitten with Ru-Andria.<\/span>\u201cShe\u2019s just beautiful and wonderful,\u201d Ringhofer said. \u201cShe\u2019s been so good. I\u2019m gonna really miss her.\u201d<\/span>Swift and Ringhofer have promised to stay in contact.<\/span>Learn more in this video.<\/span>Proper BCS greatergood_ctg_abovevideo<\/span><\/span>Source<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Airlines have different policies when it comes to minimum age requirements to fly. Some airlines allow newborns to fly at just two days old. Others require that babies be at least two weeks old.Rubin Swift was unaware of this potential issue. When he went to check in to a Frontier Airlines flight in Phoenix, Arizona, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":20116,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5137],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20115","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20115","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20115"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20115\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":45684,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20115\/revisions\/45684"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/20116"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20115"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20115"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ogkologos.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20115"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}