Jakarta –
Delta Airlines passengers feel dumped by the airline after their flight was diverted to an island and stuck there for half a day. Instead of calming down, the staff instead uttered unpleasant sentences.
Reporting from Insider, Wednesday (13/9/2023) the passenger landed on an island in Portugal and could not leave the airport for 12 hours. One of the passengers also shared his experience on social media.
He said that while waiting, the passengers were told to drink water from the bathroom tap and had to negotiate first to get food.
“We were abandoned by Delta and treated like cockroaches by airport representatives in the Terceira Islands,” said Nana Asante-Smith.
Asante-Smith said they arrived around 06.00 and the flight crew was immediately taken to the hotel. However, passengers are asked to stay put and try to contact Delta for more information.
“We tried to contact Delta during this time, and determine what exactly happened, but to no avail,” Asante-Smith said.
Meanwhile, airport representatives initially told passengers they would be given food and that a plane from Boston would arrive in a few hours to pick them up. But he said the food did not arrive, and passengers were only given ham sandwiches, juice boxes and biscuits after pleading. Asante regrets that airlines do not tolerate food containing pork for Muslim passengers on planes.
“This is interesting, because anyone who is familiar with West Africa or our Muslim brothers and sisters knows that many people have taboos on eating pork,” Asante-Smith said.
He said passengers were confused by the response from airport representatives. Passengers also received no information from Delta about what they could expect for hours.
Several people in his travel group received messages from airline representatives that appeared to be copied and pasted. Others were told that rescue ships were coming, Asante-Smith added.
When an elderly passenger asked for a water bottle, he was told by an airport staff member that they could drink water from the tap in the bathroom. It didn’t stop there, none of them were given glasses, even drinking bottles were limited.
“The same staff repeatedly told the passengers to be grateful for a second chance at life,” Asante-Smith said.
Kiaundra Eggleston, another passenger on the flight, posted a video on social media showing a female staff member confronting the passenger.
“This female representative told us that we should be grateful they allowed us to be here and that our plane did not crash in the ocean,” Eggleston wrote.
Asante-Smith said a flight finally arrived to pick up the Delta passengers around 6 p.m., 12 hours after they landed in Terceira.
After landing at New York’s JFK International Airport and taking their complaints to Delta, passengers were told the airline was overwhelmed. Asante and her husband ended up booking themselves a flight home and a nearby hotel, and left JFK the next day.
Airline clarification
A Delta Air Lines spokesperson told Insider that Flight 157 from Ghana to New York was diverted to Terceira, a Portuguese island in the Atlantic, due to mechanical problems with the backup oxygen system. Oxygen in the cabin and cockpit was not affected, but the plane landed in Terceira out of an abundance of caution.
In response to the complaints, a Delta spokesperson told Insider that the 215 passengers on Flight 157 were given food in Terceira, and waited about 12 hours for another plane to arrive from Lisbon.
They also said the customer’s bags were sent on the original plane to JFK because the second plane only had a one-hour landing time at Lajes Airport.
When asked about claims that Delta was overwhelmed as passengers arrived at JFK, the spokesperson pointed to severe weather conditions on the US east coast that weekend that they said caused airline staff to be inundated with requests.
The spokesperson added that customers were also given refunds.
Asante-Smith said she was sent a USD 400 voucher and emailed a full ticket refund, but had not received the money as of Monday morning. He added that he still hasn’t received his bag either.
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(sym/fem)
2023-09-12 22:02:00
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