Former UFC lightweight champion Khabib Nurmagomedov has released his first statement after he was tossed from a flight this past Saturday that was traveling from Las Vegas, Nevada to Los Angeles, California. Nurmagomedov was traveling to L.A. to help corner his cousin, Umar Nurmagomedov, for his bantamweight title fight against current champion Merab Dvalishvili at UFC 311 on Jan 18 from inside Intuit Dome.
Details were scarce at first so all fight fans had to go on was a short clip of Nurmagomedov calmly talking to a flight attendant trying to understand why he was being asked to move from his seat. The UFC legend was eventually removed from the airplane and caught another flight to L.A. a few hours later.
It was later discovered that the flight attendant had asked Nurmagomedov if he could assist with a potential evacuation as he was sitting in an exit row. The former UFC champion doesn’t speak perfect English, but well enough to understand what was being asked of him and to answer correctly. However, there still seemed to be a language barrier that the flight attendant did not feel like navigating through.
On Sunday, Nurmagomedov took to social media to break his silence on the whole ordeal. Khabib was able to keep his cool while discussing exactly what transpired, but he mentioned potential discrimination for race and nationality. That’s not a good look whenever those allegations are brought up.
Check out Khabib’s official statement below and let us know what you think about all of this:
First of all, I need to clarify that it was @FlyFrontier not AlaskaAir.
Lady who comes to me with questions was very rude from the very beginning, even though I speak very decent English and can understand everything and agreed to assist, she still insists on removing me from my…— khabib nurmagomedov (@TeamKhabib) January 12, 2025
“First of all, I need to clarify that it was [Frontier Airlines], not Alaska Air.
“Lady who comes to me with questions was very rude from the very beginning, even though I speak very decent English and can understand everything and agreed to assist, she still insists on removing me from my seat. What was the base for that, racial, national or other one, I’m not sure.
“But after 2 minutes of conversation, she called security and I was deplaned from this aircraft, after [an hour and a half] I boarded another airline one and left to my destination.
“I did my best to stay calm and respectful as you can see on the video.
“But those crew members could do better next time and just be nice with clients.”
