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Ex-PepsiCo CEO Indra Nooyi worked from midnight until 5 a.m. as a receptionist to pay for her Yale degree—and she says ‘respect went up’ because of it

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Shark Tank's Kevin O'Leary says if he were 25 today, he'd chase these two booming opportunities in the world of AI

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China’s birth rate just hit its lowest point since 1949—and Trip.com cofounder James Liang thinks that’s a threat to innovation
American Airlines Group

Whoops! American Airlines Flight Attendant Spills Drink on Company’s CEO

By
Chris Morris
Chris Morris
Former Contributing Writer
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By
Chris Morris
Chris Morris
Former Contributing Writer
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April 11, 2019, 12:13 PM ET
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Accidents sometimes happen when beverages are served on airplanes and it’s never a fun moment when a flight attendant spills a drink on a passenger. But when that passenger happens to be the airline’s CEO, it takes awkward to a new level.

American Airlines’ Madison Peters learned that the hard way on a recent flight from Phoenix to Dallas, spilling a notable part of a tray of drinks onto CEO Doug Parker.

“I was serving drinks during boarding to the first class cabin,” she wrote on her Instagram page. “I had a full tray with drinks on it, when the passenger in front of me stops in the aisle and backs up. He bumps into the tray and the drinks go flying. … Guess who they land on. Half of them went all over me, the other half in Doug’s lap.”

Peters says she has never before spilled a drink on a passenger in 4.5 years of work in the sky.

“I WAS MORTIFIED,” she wrote. “I wanted to drop dead right there in the aisle.”

https://www.instagram.com/p/Bv-WzpSjJgf/

Parker took it all in stride, she says, coming back to chat with her about the incident later and joking about it with her for the rest of the flight.

“When he was getting off the plane he told me he’d never forget me…. guess that’s a good thing right?,” wrote Peters.

About the Author
By Chris MorrisFormer Contributing Writer

Chris Morris is a former contributing writer at Fortune, covering everything from general business news to the video game and theme park industries.

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