mathemagic

Vomiting in itself isn't a medical emergency, nor is it a reliable indicator of one to come. Kids throw up. They have the "barf bags" in the seats because people vomit on planes. Either there is more to the story or the threshold for removing someone is far too low.

FlyerJ

It's pretty rare that anyone, regardless of age, vomits for no reason at all. It's illness (since it's unlikely to be intoxication in this case.)

Barf bags are on planes so that people can use them while in-flight ... since they're stuck on a plane high up in the air, with nowhere to go, and very limited bathroom access. The fact that those bags are on board does not mean that puking while seated in a tiny metal tube for an extended period of time, in the middle of 150 other people sitting in very, very close quarters, is a safe or acceptable thing.

If someone is puking or is presenting symptoms that could make other passengers sick - absolutely, they should deny boarding. Anything more than a cold? Get off the plane. I'd be furious if my seatmate puked while seated next to me before takeoff and the cabin crew just smiled and told the person to just ring the call button whenever he/she needed more barf bags over the next three or four hours.

The silliness in this story is not the fact that they were kicked off the plane. That was the right call. It's too bad that neither the flight crew nor the ground staff seemed able to communicate with the family professionally or clearly about why they were denied travel. (My hunch is that WestJet crews would struggle with that too.) Our good-ol anti-airline crusader Gabor L, quoted in this article, has been quoted a few times before in other stories where he's defended sick peoples' right to take flights while sitting in the middle of a plane full of healthy people. I just don't get it.

The big problem here is that Swoop/WestJet chose not to show any compassion at all in rebooking the family. Regardless of tariffs or fare rules, it just reeks of greed and lack of compassion that they'd try to charge the same family gobs of extra money over and above what they already paid. When they hear 'small child' plus 'sick' plus 'Christmas vacation' all in the same sentence, both Swoop and WS staff need to have the authority to act with decency and quickly come up with a compassionate solution rather than default to enforcing the 'make them pay' fare rules.

Frequentlander

My experience of raising kids is that they have the ability to puke in a most spectacular manner, with very little reason or encouragement at the least convenient time. It's what they do.

Mini Frequentlander #2 , stuccoed most of the inside of a 737 once with zero warning. I was simultaneously embarrassed, humiliated and impressed.

ricktoronto

And on the 31st for me to neatly put my peanut shells in since there is probably some peanut ban entering Canada and I did not want to toss the uneaten bag.

Error 601

When I was a kid I had terrible panic attacks that usually ended in me barfing although that was more likely to happen on road trips.

Fiordland

Agreed the best outcome for any story that has small kits, vomit, Christmas vacation and denied boarding will not come out well. Best option should be to keep the family happy and out of the press.

It is one thing where the passenger decides not to fly and based on his/her decision forfeits the value of the ticket.

It is completely different when the airline make the decision that the passenger can not fly and the passenger is not entitled to a refund. In any other business that would be completely unacceptable behavior. You pay for a service/product in advance and the provider of the service decides to not deliver the service and still keep the money. Regardless if WestJet is offering this under their main brand or their Swoop brand, this behavior is completely unacceptable.

Reading the article the WS/Swoop staff clearly had the authority to make this correct, since it sounds like they went through different options and the options was changing. Clearly the WS/Swoop front line staff are empowered to "negotiate" some kind of arrangement.

24left

Full article

https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/hamil...lled-1.5428135

tracon

"Some passengers have been stuck in Cancun since Jan. 14"

AKA as yesterday.


"When they heard about the longer delay, they approached the staff to get Jesse's medication from his checked baggage."
"He needs medication every five hours or else he's in pain," Woo says.

So presumably the pax checks bags two hours before a 4 hour flight, but needs medication every 5 hours?

FlyerJ

I’m also a fan of the ridiculous hyperbole that comes out whenever leisure travelers whose only foreign travel consists of all-inclusive resorts comment on their airline-provided accommodations at an airport hotel:

In other words, no swim up bar, and it was in an area that was probably quite typical, authentic Latin America.

I’m pretty sure that I’ve stayed at worse airport hotels at Pearson Airport (which many don’t realize is situated squarely in Milton cartel territory, near the border with the infamous Etobicoke mafia’s territory).

(That aside, Swoop does have an IRROPS problem. And when they’re flying overly-sensitive, inexperienced leisure travelers they need to get much better at responding to and communicating throughout a cancellation.)

ricktoronto

Let's be honest they are continually doing this and doing this terribly. That said you have to be a total loon to fly on any of these airlines regardless of who owns it. Being told on the 14th you cannot leave until the 25th is just stupid. They could fly on AA, CM, AV (I think) and AC non-stop back to Canada fairly easily at this time of year.

Swoop knows quite well their target customer is unsophisticated and obviously loopy enough to fly on them, probably cash strapped as well.

If their IRROPS protocol is deadhead a flight back for an injured FA then put that aircraft back in service on other routes until other schedules recover an aircraft back to Cancun, they are flat out dopes.

Fiordland

So the only real question is when will WestJet step in and fix the disaster that is Swoop. Yes, the CBC has perfected the skill of making a delay sound bad. However WestJet has been unable to deal with these issues in a reasonable way under its Swoop banner.

sokolov

I wouldn't call eleven days a "delay". It's a bonus holiday! :-)

Badenoch

I have no sympathy for dunderheads who fly discount airlines and don't have the means to get home on their own when things go wrong. I've been to the Cancun airport and am quite confident I could find a seat on a plane that would get me home a lot sooner than waiting on Swoop. And anyone who puts the pain medication he needs every five hours into his checked baggage for a four hour flight deserves the pain.

mxqisit

From yesterday:


From July:


The lie detector test determined that you were lying.

Frequentlander

Nice.