A JetBlue flight from Paris to New York has suffered an embarrassing double diversion, with passengers spending two extra nights in hotels at the expense of the airline after a technical fault which was meant to have been fixed reared its ugly head again.
The sorry tale of what passengers on JetBlue flight B6-1908 have been put through started on July 11 when their scheduled flight from Paris Charles De Gaulle to New York JFK departed the French capital at around 2 pm.
Around an hour and a half into the flight, and as the aircraft was just passing the west coast of Ireland, the pilots suddenly decided to turn back and diverted the plane back to Paris.
Passengers were told that a fuel gauge had broken and it was therefore not safe to continue on to New York because the pilots did not know how much fuel the aircraft had left.
What’s strange is that the flight was being operated by an almost brand-new Airbus A321neo, although even new planes can suffer technical faults.
Once safely on the ground in Paris, passengers complained that there was only one JetBlue representative to help everyone onboard, although they were eventually secured accommodation and transport to the hotel for the night.
JetBlue had planned to fly out a replacement part from its New York hub, get the plane fixed and then fly the stranded passengers on the same aircraft the following day.
The part was shipped successfully, and although it took slightly longer than planned, the plane was apparently fixed and allowed to depart Paris once again at around 4 pm on July 12.
That should have been the end of the matter, but unfortunately, the exact same technical fault cropped up again, and this time, the plane had only flown a short distance further than the day before.
On this occasion, the pilots opted to divert the plane to Dublin, where the passengers were once again shipped off to hotels to wait out for a replacement flight.
Some passengers have now been rebooked onto alternative flights from Dublin, while some passengers who just wanted to get to New York JFK are being made to wait out for a third attempt later on Saturday.
The bizarre turn of events did at least create a sense of camaraderie amongst the stranded passengers and JetBlue has apologized for the pretty extensive delay that has beset its customers.
Under European passenger rights regulations known as EC261, passengers will be able to claim €600 per person which is the highest level of monetary compensation available under the legislation.
The compensation kicks in if passengers arrive at their destination more than three hours later than scheduled due to reason within the airline’s control. Technical defects have long been established as part and parcel of an airline’s everyday operations and therefore within their control.
Unfortunately, the compensation doesn’t increase if you are delayed twice, although the second flight was operated under a different flight number, so it will be interesting to see if any passengers attempt to double dip!
TOTH: One Mile at a Time
Jet Blue can be fine when things are going normally, but they are absolutely hopeless with irregular operations.