Everyone wants to start afresh in the New Year rather than being stuck at the airport, awaiting texts from the airline that one’s flight has been delayed by one more hour. The advent of 2018 saw many city youngsters stuck in limbo as cities like Delhi saw 300 flights delayed with eight cancelled, and 96 flights disrupted in Bengaluru — so party plans were on a back burner, and airport watch was on agenda!
Many of the city’s working populace were stranded at the airport for close to seven hours, and while some airlines chose to fly after the delay, many just cancelled flights. Needless to say, it was not the start to the new year that many had envisioned! Jackie Jose, a social media manager was flying from Muscat and spoke of the chaos at the airport, “I was boarding a flight from Muscat to Bengaluru on New Year Day. There were three flights scheduled to take off at 9 am; obviously not all of them could take off at the same time so a delay was expected. My flight was honestly not that bad, even though there was a delay of 50 minutes. However there was another group who were to be boarded but there was no boarding call, and there were loud arguments and angry scenes.”
Many were also waiting for their family members to arrive and Sabita Chanda, an NGO worker was among those. “My sister was travelling from Delhi to Bengaluru. Her flight at 7:00 pm took off at 12:30 am. It was such a huge inconvenience as she was travelling alone with my three-year-old nephew as they reached home at 2.30 am,” she states.
Sahil Gupta, a 30-year-old entrepreneur had been trying to get to the Garden City for the past few days, but all his flights were either delayed or cancelled. “Though the flights were delayed, I saw a lot of people fighting or arguing with airline staff. I think as passengers we need to understand that the weather is not something an airline can control. They fail to understand that delays cause losses to the airline as well,” he advices.
An airline spokesperson elaborates on the flight delay, “As an airline, we inform passengers way ahead of time about the possible weather conditions and are active on social media about the possibility of delays or cancellations so that everyone is in the loop.” But, for many, the delays led to needless stress and losses too. Compensating passengers, many airlines provided free meals during flight.
