A319
Flight Crew Air Transport Pilot (ATP)
Other / Unknown
Aircraft Equipment Problem Critical; Flight Deck / Cabin / Aircraft Event Passenger Misconduct
General Maintenance Action
Human Factors
After landing a Mechanic came up to the flight deck to ask if we had any knowledge about a piece of tape over an oxygen panel in row 13 DEF in the cabin. This was the first time we had heard anything about it. Apparently a passenger had taken a picture or video of a piece of tape on a passenger oxygen panel and posted it online with a message stating something to the effect of 'I hope I don't need oxygen'. There were no MEL's on the maintenance log or the flight release. If there had been; the seat row would have been blocked. The First Officer and I went through all logbooks on the flight deck and found no write ups for anything to do with the passenger oxygen system. Apparently; Maintenance did not put the tape there. Concerns: Why were the flight attendants not notified by this passenger about the tape if he was concerned about it enough to take a picture and post it to the Internet? How did this passenger know that this was an oxygen panel? It is not labeled as such. The tape used had an FAA stamp on it. According to second or third hand information; the picture was posted to a Facebook account and forwarded to some friends; one of which happened to be the Vice President of Maintenance. Maintenance personnel removed the tape; placed an MEL on the system and blocked that row just to be safe. We continued the next series of flights. Is possible to track the person down by their Internet posting; or by checking the passenger manifest and checking for airline experience? Sounds suspicious to me.
A319 Captain is informed after gate arrival of a piece of tape over a passenger oxygen panel in the cabin. Maintenance became aware of the issue due to an Internet posting of a photo taken by a passenger. No write ups or MEL's could be found concerning this panel.