Originally Posted by WR Cage

I took a look at a still image of the BP on my larger than life TV last night. Some notes:
- The pax was flying on AC149, 333 service to YUL.
- The pax was #63 to check in which would strongly suggest that the first checkin was completed online.
- The BP was card stock BP indicating it was re-issued by an agent at the checkin desk.
- The BP stated WCHR on the airline remarks, indicating that the pax can walk short distances and can walk from the gate onto the aircraft. The code WCHS is used for more restrictive conditions such as cannot walk up/down stairs, requires assistance throughout the journey.
- The ticket was an Aeroplan reward ticket booked in economy.
- The pax was seated in 19H. Regular economy seat. Being a 333, row 19 is not in preferred section of the cabin.

Other notes from the Globalnews interview:
- Pax travelled from Seschelt to YVR. Google maps the trip at 1.5 hours but I would venture that early in the morning 2.5 hours is a better trip estimate.
- the TV crews filmed the international AC checkin desk and the international preboard security area. However as stated above the pax likely used the domestic special services desk and checkpoint C preboard security.
- The daughter was in the airport for quite some time, so i have to guess the car was parked in short-term parkade. It is not stated in the news article whether the pax was dropped off at the door or walked from the parkade to the checkin desks.
- Pax walked fine with a cane.

As to the question about whether the daughter was lying about pre-ordering a wheelchair, with an Aeroplan reward ticket it is possible that AE did not put the WCHR request on file or may have instead placed a note on file. There is insufficient data in the article to conclude the Daughter is lying. It could simply be that the Global reporter has requested that certain details are exaggerated and/or left out in order to make the story more compact and simple.

My primary concern/question is at what time did the pax present themselves at the checkin desk. AC recommends that WCHR pax add on an additional 1 hour to the recommended checkin time. For AC149 this means the pax is recommended to be at the checkin counter at 9am. Taking Vancouver rush hour traffic into consideration this would mean leaving Seschelt at 7am.

Although not stated in the Global piece. I would venture a guess the pax arrived at the checkin desk at the 1.5 to 1.25 hour mark. This would cause the checkin desk to state that a wheel chair was not available and encourage the pax to walk to and through security. There are golf carts on the airside to take pax from preboard security to their gate.

at 10-10:30am the regular line at checkpoint C is backed up and snakes around for 20 minutes of walking. If the pax walked to the security lane, they would not be able to use the special assistance lane and likely got shunted to the regular line.

Seeing the big bold wheelchair symbol on the BP, why didn't the CATSA BP scanner send the pax to the appropriate special services lane? This action likely would have prevented the fall just as much as getting a wheelchair.

Another question left unanswered from the Global piece. Was the daughter's first intention to get a gate pass and escort the pax to the gate or was the initial request for wheelchair assistance from the checkin desk? The daughter mentioned on TV that she requested to escort her mom through the terminal but AC said no. My personal beef with these types of news articles is that important aspects are sometime left out. A potential "smoking gun" is that the daughter made such a empassioned plea for a gate pass that the WCHR request was an afterthought. Further,had the daughter requested WCHR or WCHS service at the outset, none of this would have happened.