A Las Vegas-based flight attendant from Southwest Airlines died of COVID-19 on Tuesday, according to his family and staff.
Maurice “Reggie” Shepperson, a native of New York, whose brightly colored pants earned him the nickname Skittles while training in 2014, tested positive for COVID in early July and, according to Marcia Hildreth, fought the virus in the hospital for a month. Southwest flight attendant who made it her best Friend called.
He was on a ventilator and died early Tuesday, his mother Dawn Shepperson told USA TODAY. A nurse told her it was from COVID.
Shepperson, 36, was fully vaccinated, said his mother and Hildreth. He loved to fly and took every precaution, wearing a mask, constantly washing his hands, disinfecting surfaces and wiping everything in hotel rooms, Hildreth said.
“It hurt so much because it happened so quickly,” said Dawn Shepperson. “I haven’t even had the time to really appreciate what’s going on. That’s overwhelming. It’s not real. It’s not real. It’s not real. ”
Hildreth said she was also incredulous.
“I’ll miss my boyfriend,” she said.
Southwest spokesman Brandy King confirmed a Las Vegas-based employee died Tuesday but declined to provide details. Shepperson’s mother said the airline reached out to her and Hildreth said Southwest contacted her after Shepperson’s death and withdrew her from a work trip so she could fly to Las Vegas on Wednesday.
“We are heartbroken over the loss of our Southwest employee,” King said in a statement. “Out of respect for the family, we have no additional information that we can pass on.”
Southwest and other airlines have not released statistics on the number of COVID cases and flight crew deaths. The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA, which represents flight attendants from United, Frontier, Spirit and Hawaiian Airlines, among others, has estimated that 4,000 flight attendants from all airlines in the United States have been infected with the virus and 20 have died.
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Shepperson worked throughout the pandemic and was withdrawn from work multiple times due to COVID-19 exposure, Hildreth said. But he never tested positive until July, she said.
Shepperson was what colleagues call a high-flyer: he took on more business trips than most. Partly to make money, partly to travel wherever he could.
Kiki Lee attended Shepperson’s flight attendant training class in Dallas, where Southwest is based, in 2014.
After five weeks of training, she and other new flight attendants just wanted to go home. Shepperson began to take advantage of his employee flight benefits. One of the first trips, Lee recalls, was to China.
“He’s really made a name for himself and took advantage of his advantages,” said Lee. “He loved the work and he loved the perks.”
Shepperson’s Facebook page shows off his travel adventures, including several work trips to Hawaii. In June he took his mother with him for the ride. His mother said this was one of his last work trips for Southwest before testing positive.
“He loved traveling and everyone who knew him knew he loved his mother,” said Lee.
Travis Pittman, another Las Vegas-based flight attendant for Southwest, met Shepperson when he moved from Tampa to Nevada in 2016.
“That New York look can be tough and stuff,” he said. “But he was like a teddy bear, so cute on the inside and very, very loving. It’s just fun to be around. ”
Dawn Shepperson said Reggie, who raised her alone after his father’s death at the age of 14 months, made her proud every time she walked through a Southwest terminal at an airport.
“People I don’t even know said when they found out I was Reggie’s mom,“ Maam, you did a nice job. That’s a fine young man, ” she said. “As a mother, I feel so blessed and proud because I just wanted to raise my son right.”
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