A video showing passengers brutally slapping ground staff and smashing lunch box on the female staff only for flight delay has triggered outrages on Chinese social media.

A flight scheduled on Monday en route from central China's Changsha to southern China's Sanya was delayed due to bad weather, and three passengers suddenly lost their temper when arguing with the ground staff over the delay.

One of the passengers, a middle-aged woman, was seen smashing and throwing her lunch box at a female ground staff who was later seen bursting into tears. Another middle-aged man was captured on the video slapping another female ground staff on face and was heard scolding “I’m hitting you! So what?”

The three passengers are later detained for disrupting public order and are subject to further investigations, according to the police.