AIR China issued a public apology yesterday after a flight was canceled because of two passengers who claimed to be VIPs of the carrier disrupted the take-off at the Shenzhen airport late Thursday night.
The Shanghai-bound aircraft returned to the gate and the flight was canceled after taxiing on the runway twice because a man and a woman who claimed to hold VIP membership of the airline weren t happy about their seats, Shenzhen Evening News reported.
According to video footage posted on popular Web sites by one of the passengers, the woman, whose identity was not available, refused to sit down and stood in the aisle even though the plane had started taxiing. Her companion whose identity also was not known, argued with flight attendants that they were airline VIP cardholders and he was a friend of a board director of the airline. I could tell the board director to halt the plane, he shouted in the cabin.
The airline denied the two people were VIPs, but refused to disclose their identities.
The News said the two passengers wanted to sit next to each other, but by the time they checked in, there were no adjacent seats vacant. They refused to be seated when the plane began taxiing for take-off. Two American passengers on the plane offered to change their seats with the two people after learning that their refusal to sit had halted take-off. But the pair refused the offer and continued threatening to halt the flight.
The aircraft finally returned to the terminal and the flight captain required all passengers to disembark. Passengers were told to go through security checks again before reboarding the plane. But when the passengers started to reboard the plane at about 9:30 p.m., the flight was announced canceled due to foggy weather in Shanghai, the News said.
Passengers were furious when they learned of the cancellation. They surrounded a minibus the man had boarded and asked for an apology and compensation.
The footage showed that the crowd remained restrained. No one had assaulted the man who slipped over after he left the bus under great pressure. (SD News)
