Beginning on March 25, Korean Air replaced the famous ‘honey peanuts’ provided to passengers with crackers. (image: Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, Apr. 1 (Korea Bizwire) — Korean Air Lines Co. has stopped providing peanuts onboard its flights to protect passengers with allergies.
Beginning on March 25, Korean Air replaced the famous ‘honey peanuts’ provided to passengers with crackers. In addition, peanut-related recipes will be excluded from all meals provided to the passengers.
Passengers with severe peanut allergies can suffer from various symptoms just by having someone next to them eat peanuts.
Recently, a 10-year-old boy with a peanut allergy could not board the Korean Air flight bound for Manila, the Philippines, due to the peanuts being served to the passengers.
In July 2017, a 3-year-old boy had an allergic reaction after opening a bag of peanuts provided onboard by Singapore Airlines, following a similar case in 2016 where an Australian woman had a severe reaction to peanuts onboard the same airline.
After the series of incidents, Singapore Airlines decided to stop serving peanuts to passengers last year in April. Qantas Airways, Air New Zealand and British Airways all followed suit.
In the United States, schools separate students with peanut allergies to have lunch at designated locations away from others.
Korean Air said the recent measure has nothing to do with the 2014 “nut rage” incident, which involved then-vice president Heather Cho throwing nuts at a flight attendant after being dissatisfied with the service.
“This is a minimum safety measure for all passengers with peanut allergies,” said Korean Air. “We are following the decisions of major airlines worldwide.”
H. M. Kang (hmkang@koreabizwire.com)
