Hannah Babalola says KLM captain and crew told her on Air Travel flight 598 that she could not use an onboard wheelchair to reach the toilet on a journey from Cape Town to Amsterdam. She said the nearly 11-hour trip left her with a choice between leaving the plane and accepting that she would not use the toilet.
Babalola, a wheelchair user and Paralympic athlete, said she had booked special assistance at least 48 hours before flying. She also said she had no trouble receiving assistance on her outward journey, and that the captain and crew still refused aisle-chair access on the return flight.
KLM flight 598
The flight was on 26 May, after Babalola had been in Cape Town. She said the captain and crew told her she would not be able to access an aisle chair, the onboard wheelchair used by disabled passengers to reach the toilet during a flight.
When she disputed that, Babalola said the crew told her that if she needed the toilet, she would have to do so without a wheelchair. She said they added that if that was not possible, she would have to get off the flight altogether.
Police and security
Babalola said the crew called police and security after she stood her ground. Police and security declined to take any action against her, and she eventually agreed not to use the toilet during the flight so she could get home.
“It was the first time anything like this had happened to me on a plane,” she said. “They made me feel as if I wasn’t a human.” She also said: “The humiliation was unbearable.”
Accessible travel rules
The Civil Aviation Authority says assistance for accessible air travel includes help moving through airports and when boarding and disembarking planes. It says those rights apply only to people flying from UK airports on any airline and for returns to the UK on either UK or EU airlines.
The World Health Organization said in 2023 that approximately 16% of the global population experiences significant disability, about 1.3 billion people. In July 2025, the National Centre for Accessible Transport published Invisible Barriers: How public attitudes affect inclusive travel, saying people with impairments or access needs outside certain models have to fight to get those needs met and can face abuse from other passengers.
The practical question left by Babalola’s case is straightforward: why the captain and crew refused aisle-chair access on a wide-bodied flight when special assistance had been booked in advance. For disabled passengers, the issue is not abstract policy but whether the promised assistance reaches the toilet on long-haul flights.
