Originally Posted by
mvoight
But, a "must fly" passenger is not the same as a reduction in capacity of the aircraft, and clearly the rules make an exception for capacity reduction. The rules were created for an "oversold" situation. That is, to restrict airlines from overselling seats, not to
restrict them from not using seats due to safety issues which occurred on the way to remote location.
The correct number of seats were sold, but the number of seats were reduced after the sale, due to the plane having a mechanical issue.
In fact, the results are the similar to if they had replaced the broken plane with one which had 2 fewer seats, because that is effectively what they did.
On the other hand, the airlines are still on the hook for IDB for weight and balance issues for aircraft with greater than 60 seats. So clearly, the intent of the regulation is still to penalize the airline as an oversell for not being able to carry ticketed passengers, including in scenarios where the seating capacity is reduced on that same same aircraft.