PIA’s 30 minutes mean nine hours

Amsterdam-bound flight cancelled after 9 hours delay

AROUND 300 passengers, scheduled to fly to Amsterdam aboard PIA PK 737, were put through horrendous torment on the coldest day of winter at the Allama Iqbal International Airport for nine hours by the Great People to Fly With – or not.

The Flight PK 737 was to leave for Amsterdam via Frankfurt at 9am for which the passengers were called by PIA at 6:00 am. Keeping in mind that it was the coldest day in Lahore that broke a 50 year old record of low temperatures, the passengers were then told that their flight is delayed for 30 minutes.

After 30 minutes, they were told to wait for another 30 minutes after which it went to 30 more minutes and so on. This never-ending streak of 30 minutes continued while the passengers could do nothing but repent their decision of being patriotic and choosing the national career.

Around 2pm Tuesday, at wits end, the passengers, many of whom were traveling with women and children, asked the PIA officials to have mercy and tell them what was the actual status of their flight and when it would leave as they had been waiting for over eight hours. The officials told them to wait for “another 30 minutes.”

Among those who had come to the airport to board the flight were those who had come all the way from other cities and had nowhere to go but to camp at the airport. After waiting for another couple of 30 minutes, the passengers were finally apprized of the fact that their flight had been cancelled.

This infuriated the passengers who had no idea that after nine hours of freezing torture they would be shown the door.

The passengers started protesting at the airport and chanted slogans against the PIA management. In protest, the passengers refused to leave the airport premises and pressed the PIA to arrange an aircraft for them and schedule their flight.

While talking to this correspondent, the passengers expressed utter dissent and fury, saying that they had never been dealt with so unprofessionally in their lives and PIA officials and management would be sued for this had the this been a sane country.

The PIA spokesperson, however, argued that operational hazards due to dense fog in Islamabad had prohibited the aircraft from arriving at Lahore for the scheduled flight and the passengers were made aware of the situation. The spokesperson said that the flight would now leave on Thursday.

Posted in: Lahore