United Airlines CEO said it wasn't so much what he thought, but what he felt when he first saw the video of law enforcement officials dragging a man off one of his planes.
"Probably the word 'shame' comes to mind," Munoz told ABC News in his first interview since the incident.
United has been under fire since Sunday night, when a video first appeared on Facebook regarding the events on Flight 3411 from Chicago to Louisville.
United asked for four volunteers to give up their seats so that airline crew members could be in Louisville by the morning for new assignments. But it was the last flight of the night, the next wasn't until 3 p.m. Monday, and none of the passengers were enticed even by $1,000 in compensation and an overnight hotel stay.
When UA then chose four passengers to be removed and re-booked, the shocking video emerged of one man who refused to give up his seat and was dragged down the aisle, bleeding from the mouth, by law enforcement authorities to be removed from the plane.
Since then, United has suffered from an embarrassing slate of public relations miscues with its apologies, including from Munoz himself.
"I think my first reaction to most issues is to get the facts and circumstances," he says in the interview. "And my initial words fell short of truly expressing what we were feeling. And that's something that I've learned from."
Munoz said United will be reviewing all its policies, including the use of law enforcement boarding a plane.
"The use of law enforcement aboard an aircraft has to be looked at very carefully," he said. "They're clearly there for a purpose of safety, and we want to make sure they protect us, but for other reasons, I think that's a policy we have to absolutely relook at."
Here's the full video from ABC News.
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