A delayed Air India Express flight caused a lot of inconvenience to passengers flying from Abu Dhabi to Thiruvananthapuram in the South Indian state of Kerala.
The flight scheduled to depart at 11.55pm on Friday was finally rescheduled to 9.10pm on Saturday after a failed attempt to depart at 4.30pm due to continuous technical snags, according to a senior airline executive.
“Of the 156 passengers, we offered hotel accommodation to 136 passengers [as others had cancelled or rescheduled their bookings],” Ranjan Datta, manager, Air India Abu Dhabi and Al Ain, told
However, 36 of them could not come out of the airport as some of them had their residence visas already cancelled and others were on visit visas, according to an affected passenger.
Passengers were accommodated at a nearby hotel and those on visit visas or expired visas had to stay in the airport. Passengers complained about the lack of facilities provided to them by Air India Express officials.
An ambulance had to be called for one person, suffering from a medical condition, another passenger said.
Meanwhile, the passengers were again boarded onto the flight at 4 pm on Saturday, but offloaded a second time at 5 pm, citing the same technical problem. “A frustrated mother placed her baby in front of the officials as she had no baby food to give the infant,” a passenger said, narrating the dramatic scenes. Air India Express finally took off at 9.12 pm from Terminal 1, a full 24 hours late.
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