Las Vegas instead of Stansted

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Viewing 11 posts - 1 through 11 (of 11 total)

  • MartynSinclair
    Participant

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-4786708/Businessman-trying-fly-Essex-ends-LAS-VEGAS.html

    This story is doing the rounds. Is it that ridiculous anybody could possibly board a flight to the wrong destination??

    The key sentence for me is towards the end of the article where Eurowings places the blame…

    “Due to an error by a service provider’s employee, the passenger managed to board the long-haul flight.”

    My situation a month or so back when a service provider employee at FRA decided passengers flying to London no longer need to have their ID checked at the gates, causing the pilot to order an ID check on board – shows that airlines using third parties need to be 100% accountable for the work of their service providers.

    I also find it strange the passenger was charged for his return flight & then banned from Eurowings, unless of course Eurowings were peeved at the fine they would have had to pay to the US authorities for boarding an incorrect passenger.

    I know some people are questioning the intelligence of the passenger, but if the 2 flights were boarding at adjoining gates, joining the incorrect Q is easily done..

    Would love to hear the FULL story though………


    seasonedtraveller
    Participant

    You would think it impossible.

    How did he board without some kind of security issue?
    How did he just happen to get an unoccupied seat?
    Why did Eurowings ban him?

    Wow. So many questions on this one.


    MartynSinclair
    Participant

    “You would think it impossible” – yes you would, except when experiencing inept 3rd party providers and their inability to have a basic understanding of aviation security and procedures, I would think it is very possible.

    Seen and experienced……… very sadly…


    capetonianm
    Participant

    I managed to board a CPT-DUR instead of a CPT-JNB early one morning, but in those happy days in the 1970s it was all a lot more casual and you just walked out of the terminal and across the tarmac to the aircraft which were boarding at the same time and parked up next to each other. When I realised my error as I listened to the pre-departure announcements I told a member of the cabin crew and they offered to disembark me, which would have caused a delay, or take me to DUR and then put me on the next flight to JNB, which I accepted.

    It was quite common for the crews to make incorrect announcements :
    “Dames en heere, ladies and gentlemen, welcome on board SA522 to Durban …………. err …….. sorry …… SA 308 to Johannesburg.”

    I find it almost impossible to believe that such as thing can happen these days, particularly on a flight from Germany to the US.


    TominScotland
    Participant

    “This case happened several weeks ago and has already been resolved”.

    This makes me suspicious – why has the DM only reported it weeks after the event? If the passenger was so distraught…. me thinks there’s a touch of opportunism here by somebody?


    esselle
    Participant

    The DM makes a drama of anything to do with air travel. Engines “explode”, planes make “crash landings”and drop “thousands of feet in a split second.”

    It is though hard to understand how the system could have allowed this to happen.


    mkcol74
    Participant

    Sadly I read the DM piece, I don’t normally as it’s often horrific clickbait.

    Anyhoo a few commentators are calling him out & that it’s made-up. Interestingly his CGN-STN boarding pass has seat 8F. On a Eurowings A330 there is no row 8 (according to Seat Guru – he would have to be an extra-special numpty to have sat in an incorrect seat thinking it was 8F plus be extremely lucky that the seat he had chosen was not sold.

    One wonders why he was banned by the airline on his return to Germany & had to find another way home.


    LuganoPirate
    Participant

    With these electronic boarding gates I’d say it was impossible, but then stranger things have happened so maybe it’s true?


    handbag
    Participant

    I once had 2 Indian Passengers ask me where we were going , midway across the Atlantic towards San Diego. I said San Diego . They thought they were on a flight to Santiago. It obviously got lost in translation when booking.

    BA were excellent, although it was not a BA fault. They were only spending 1 night there on business, before travelling somewhere else. BA put them up in a hotel for a night and forward them to their next destination.


    OneA
    Participant

    Back in the day when BA flew from LHR to Bogata direct (I think this was 1996), I sat upstairs in a cradle Club World seat beside a chap who was also on a business trip to Colombia. We arrived and disembarked and still chatting, joined a very short queue at immigration. I gestured for him to go before me and he handed his passport to the immigration officer who looked at it and immediately looked up at the gentleman and shook his head……this chap had got this far with his wife’s passport!!
    Considering BA would have looked at it at check in and again at the gate at LHR, it just goes to show that it is not just 3rd party providers who mess up big time! The gentleman was denied entry to Columbia and returned back to LHR on the flight’s return leg.


    peterraven
    Participant

    It does seem a bit strange – wrong flight, wrong seat, expected an F seat as a window seat but it would have been a centre aisle

    Weird… True?

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