Proposed Rules Could Boot Emotional Support Animals From Flights

From CBS Los Angeles:

LOS ANGELES, LA — Millions of people fly into and out of Los Angeles International Airport every year, and it’s not uncommon to see four-legged friends to accompany a number of passengers as they travel.

“They’re my service dogs,” Heidi Collier, a traveler who suffers from a spinal cord tumor, which causes seizures. “Butter Bean will jump on me when he sees I’m gonna go to seizure,” she said. “He jumps and he will lick all over me and bite my ears attack with the seizure.”

Collier calls them her life savers — not only physically, but emotionally.

“I think having an emotional support animal is huge,” she said.

But a new proposal from the federal government could put a stop to it. Under the proposed new rules, emotional support animals would not be considered service animals. A service animal, under the new rules, would be narrowly defined as a dog that is individually trained to do work or perform a task for the benefit of a person with a disability. Ultimately, though, the decision would be up to the airline.

The new rules have been proposed to crack down on passengers traveling with unconventional pets — pigs, turkeys, miniature horses, squirrels and peacocks.

Read more at CBS Los Angeles