What It's Really Like Working On Private Jets For The Super Rich

During two phone interviews, the pilot kept dropping hints about the "alternative lifestyle" of the jet’s owner.

This man, known to be religious, divided his flights between time with his family and time with his girlfriends.

The more the conversation went on, the more Danielle realized the job involved far more than serving drinks.

She was expected to take part in intimate encounters with the girlfriends on board, while the owner looked on.

"We only fly them once a month, so it's not like you have to be a lesbian, you would just need to have fun with them," the pilot reassured her, as if that somehow made things better.

Danielle Styron has written a dishy memoir about her time as a private jet flight attendant. Olga Ginzburg for NY Post

Danielle Styron shares this disturbing interview experience—and many more wild stories from her seven years of working with the rich and powerful—in her juicy new memoir "The Mile High Club: Confessions of a Private Jet Flight Attendant" (Post Hill Press; out now), which she co-wrote with her brother James Styron.

"Names have been changed to protect (us from) the malevolent," the book’s introduction begins. "Behaviors have been presented to humble them. You know who you are."

Although Danielle ultimately passed on the job involving in-flight orgies, her career still brought her face-to-face with plenty of difficult and demanding clients.

She describes some of her passengers as "miserable, vampires of human joy."

In one example, a guest berated her for not having a specific tequila brand on board—even though it hadn’t been requested. Some wives, thin to the point of being unwell, would obsessively oversee every detail of what came out of the galley kitchen. And in another case, an assistant became so furious over a breakfast sandwich not being hot enough that she threatened to punch Danielle in the face.

Things got physical too. One woman shoved Danielle into a bulkhead during turbulence just because her pampered pups got jostled. "She treated the dogs better than any human on board," Styron recalls.

Styron worked on private planes for seven years. Courtesy of Danielle Styron

One of Danielle’s most crushing moments came after Hurricane Irma hit St. Maarten. While the island was still recovering, she was asked to find champagne for a guest who insisted on celebrating—even amid the wreckage and hardship surrounding them.

"I'm standing there thinking, 'There's no champagne. There was just a major hurricane. People are standing outside waiting for bread, and you're asking me to spend $20,000 on bubbly,'" Styron said in an interview with The Post.

There was only one supermarket open, and she went there—though reluctantly—to try and find the requested champagne. "It felt dystopian," she added, describing how surreal and upsetting it all felt.

“Names have been changed to protect (us from) the malevolent,” she writes in the intro. “Behaviors have been presented to humble them. You know who you are.” Courtesy of Jen Senn

Danielle also dealt with plenty of moral dilemmas, like a high-powered man who flew with his pregnant wife one day and brought his mistress on board just days later.

"As a woman, it was hurtful to be a part of that," she admitted. "Even though I had no choice. What was I going to do, blow my life up to be like, 'Yo, your man's cheating on you?' She probably already knew."

And yes, as hinted by the title of her memoir, there were times passengers got frisky mid-flight. She and the crew had a standard response for such moments—retreat to the front of the plane, give the guests their privacy, and then quietly handle the cleanup afterward.

"It's usually in the bathroom, galley, or right there on the sofa," she wrote, noting how common these moments were. "It's their house, right? Private jets are like flying living rooms."

Styron’s brother, James Styron, encouraged her to write about her experiences on the job. He’s a co-writer on the book. Olga Ginzburg for NY Post

Still, for all the stressful moments and chaotic encounters, there were plenty of perks too. Danielle got to travel in style, party in Vegas with pilots, and soak up the sun in Costa Rica, Aspen, and St. Barts.

During one trip in Los Angeles, her jet broke down right there on the tarmac. While the pilots scrambled to fix the issue, Danielle was left in charge of keeping the guests happy and fed. The lead passenger that day just happened to be Jamie Foxx.

Unlike many other celebrities she dealt with, Jamie stayed calm and kind through the whole ordeal.

He was "the most delightful celebrity," Danielle remembered. "He was cracking jokes and telling stories. He was pure light. [After three hours on the ground,] we were out of food, the mimosas were gone, people were losing patience, but not Jamie. He was still smiling. Still gracious. It restored my faith in humanity."

Wealthy passengers treated their private jets like private homes, Styron says, meaning they sometimes got intimate in the living room. Courtesy of Danielle Styron

But despite the fun getaways and celebrity run-ins, most of her flights were draining and emotionally exhausting.

"You think these people have it all," she explained. "But I saw the opposite. They're really insecure. Their friends are all about one-upmanship. One man owned several planes, had a beautiful wife, everything in the world, and he was obsessing about his hair plugs. Like who cares?"

Eventually, Danielle decided to step away from flying altogether and returned to her original career as an aesthetician.

Now retired from aviation, Styron works as an aesthetician. Olga Ginzburg for NY Post

She now runs Fluff NYC, a brow and skincare studio located on Manhattan’s Upper East Side.

Instead of catering to egos in the sky, she now focuses on helping people feel good about their skin and brows.

"It's less glamorous," she said with a chuckle, "but way more peaceful."