A dad has spoken out about his family’s ‘horrible’ ordeal after they were left stranded in a small Canadian town when their TUI flight from Cancun to Manchester was diverted due to an unruly passenger
A father has revealed his family’s “horrible” experience after they were left stranded in a tiny Canadian town when their flight was abruptly grounded due to a disruptive passenger.
The father, known as Mr Stockford, was returning home from an all-inclusive break with his wife and four daughters in Cancun when a man’s conduct became “aggressive and alarming” on their TUI flight bound for Manchester Airport.
Mr Stockford said the man was seated directly behind his daughters and made numerous attempts to leave the aircraft mid-flight. He then made ‘disturbing’ remarks about a “man with a knife” that scared fellow passengers, many of whom were children.
Mr Stockford claims that crew members managed to restrain the man with assistance from a doctor. However, as the aircraft neared the Pacific Ocean, he was considered too great a flight risk and the pilot chose to reroute the plane to Canada where he could be taken off by police, reports the Manchester Evening News.
According to Mr Stockford, the disruptive passenger’s wife later blamed his conduct on diazepam he purchased from a taxi driver in Mexico.
The Boeing 787-9 touched down in Gander in the early hours of Friday morning – a small town in the north-eastern part of the island of Newfoundland, Canada. Speaking about the mayhem on the aircraft, he said: “The plane landed quite firm, he tried to get up, TUI staff shouted ‘sit back down, now!’ and kids behind us were crying, thinking they were gonna’ die. They were saying, ‘why do I feel like I’m dying, mummy?’ It was horrible.”
He revealed that as he and nearly 400 passengers left the aircraft, the pilot assured them they would be “looked after”. Yet once they stepped off the plane, passengers claim they faced numerous problems and minimal communication from TUI.
“We entered a country at 3C having been in a 32C country. We had shorts on, t-shirts, babies weren’t wrapped up because of that,” he remembered.
They alleged the difficulties included sluggish transport to the hotels arranged by TUI and, upon the family’s arrival, they say they were informed their room was only available for fewer than four hours. The M.E.N. understands that hotels in the town were reserved due to a major event taking place in the area.
“On the plane the captain they were gonna’ look after us and said they were going to provide us with transport to a hotel, a free hotel, food and drink.” he said. “At that point we were thinking, ‘we’re not going to go home today, but at least we’ve got a hotel to rest in.’
“We queued up for this transfer, the transfer was a 12-seater crooked old school bus. As you can imagine, 360 passengers, it was going to take time. The hotels were three or four across Gander.
“We tried to ring a taxi because we had young children. There was only three taxi companies in Gander, it’s a population of 12,000. The taxi came, and they couldn’t take us because they had no car seat and it was illegal to drive a baby without a car seat.
“We eventually got on the bus. We got to the hotel three hours later, everyone was tired, and the hotel staff told us we’ve only got the hotel for four hours.”
After heading back to the airport on Friday, they were informed that they would have to wait another 14 hours before they could finally set off for home.
This meant that the majority of passengers were forced to bed down on the floor of Gander Airport, where they were left with scant food, drink, and clothing as most of their luggage remained on the plane.
The father-of-four, from Manchester, told the M.E.N. that word of their diversion had reached the local community, who rallied round and helped the Brits get around town to pick up essentials.
It’s not the first time such an incident has occurred in Gander, which has earned a reputation for coming to the aid of stranded travellers over the years – including on 9/11, an event that inspired the hit musical Come From Away.
He said: “Loads of locals flooded in and helped everyone get back to the airport. We’ve got a lift back to the airport for free, which was lovely. Then we had to spend 14 hours with the rest of the 360 passengers on the floors of the airport. Children sleeping on the floors, families on the floors because there was not enough seats.”
The flight was scheduled to touch down at Manchester Airport around 7:15am on Friday (June 5). However, the family didn’t make it home until Saturday (June 6). “14 hours on the airport floor, cold floors, hard floor, babies, young kids, families. Just not taken into consideration,” he said. “We got given some vouchers, but I got a photo of the airport fridges, there was hardly anything left.”
A business owner, Mr Stockford says the ordeal has left his children traumatised and resulted in a loss of earnings for both him and his wife.
“My daughters are nervous now to fly again because of the situation,” he said. “TUI from the start of being diverted to the end, just completely failed us.”
TUI has been approached for comment.
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