Korean Air ordered to pay flight attendant $18,000 after 'nut rage' incident

Korean Air continues to face the consequences of the “nut rage” incident that caused public outage.

In December 2014, Heather Cho, then a vice president with the airline, allegedly assaulted a flight attendant for serving her macadamia nuts in a bag rather than a porcelain bowl. Now, the airline is being ordered to pay the attendant 20 million South Korean won, which is equivalent to about $18,000.

Cho became notorious for her reaction to the way the nuts were served. She was a passenger seated in the first class section of a plane preparing to depart from New York’s Kennedy International Airport when she was served the snack in its original packaging, which was Korean Air’s usual practice. According to CNN, the aircraft was taxiing when Cho demanded that it return to the gate so the flight attendant involved could be removed from the plane.

Shortly after, Cho was found guilty of violating aviation law and was originally sentenced to one year in prison for assaulting the flight attendant . After she served five months, her sentence was reduced, and she was ultimately released with two years’ probation, according to CNN.

Additionally, Cho resigned from her executive position at Korean Air shortly after that incident. She later took a different executive position with the airline, but both she and her sister were fired earlier this year by their father, Cho Yang-ho, who is the CEO.

Korean Air has not yet responded to Yahoo Lifestyle’s request for comment.

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