A male passenger was reported to sexually harass four stewardesses on a Ho Chi Minh City-bound flight on Sunday and eventually left the airport without signing the record of his case, despite being booked by aviation authorities.

The passenger was traveling from Vinh, the capital city of the north-central province of Nghe An, on board the Vietjet flight VJ 271 when he wanted to use the restroom, according to a report by the cabin crew.

A stewardess then told the man, purportedly in his late 60s, whose name has not been disclosed, to wait for a while because both of the lavatories were occupied then. He shouted at her right away.

The passenger allegedly moved on to use his mobile phone to hit the flight attendant in her buttocks.

He then spent the rest of the flight in an empty seat instead of his own, and reportedly used the handset to hit three other stewardesses in their sensitive body parts. One of the three is a foreign flight attendant.

The flight captain was briefed about the situation, and called for help from security officers at Tan Son Nhat International Airport.

The passenger was therefore asked to work with security guards shortly after his arrival at the Ho Chi Minh City terminal, and was booked for causing disorder during the flight by the Southern Airports Authority.

But the man refused to cooperate with officers, and eventually left the airport without signing the case record.

Even so, the Southern Airports Authority still has the right to slap civil penalties on him, an official from the authority told Tuoi Tre(Youth) newspaper on Sunday.

The man faces a cash fine of up to VND5 million (US$223) for his harassment, and could be banned from air travel if he refuses to pay the fine, according to the Southern Airports Authority.

The man is purportedly the director of a construction company in central Vietnam, according to a source close to Tuoi Tre.