By Robert G. Yetman, Jr. Editor At Large

On a recent Siberian Airlines flight from Hong Kong to Russia, passengers mobilized quickly when they’d had enough of a passenger who had apparently been drinking and began harassing women on board the flight. Just as an initial confrontation between the inebriated man and a fellow passenger was about to significantly escalate, others witnessing what was unfolding immediately pounced on the problem flier, and began pummeling him with punches and kicks down to the floor of the plane. From there, photos show the man with his hands and legs tied up with tape and seatbelts and lying on the floor for the duration of the flight, courtesy of the others.

There’s an especially good lesson here, for all of us: A lot of people spend all kinds of time in sanitized environments, working hard at developing good self-defense techniques…but it is not, however, enough to have “skills;” you also have to be willing to step outside of your natural fear and hesitation in public places, and do what needs to be done in order to help you, and those around you, remain safe when there is an imminent threat. Hurtling through the air at 30,000 feet in a thin metal tube is no place for the kind of behavior displayed by the unruly passenger, and kudos to those around him for taking charge in a very deliberate way to eliminate a problem that could have proven disastrous for everyone on board.