Some passengers traveling with Sunwing Airlines eventually returned home after repeated flight cancellations and delays.
A Toronto-based travel company is struggling to get hundreds of passengers home from destinations including Mexico after a severe winter storm disrupted operations over the Christmas holidays. Announced on December 29, 2022, canceling flights at airports in Saskatoon and Regina, Saskatchewan due to “extenuating circumstances.” The cancellation was effective immediately and applied to travel from both airports through February 3, 2023.
the company said Statement of January 3 Its employees work around the clock to get customers home while providing hotel rooms, food and beverages, and airport transfers for other customers whose flights have been delayed.
“People who have completed all scheduled recovery flights and are still at their destination have either rescheduled a previously missed return flight or are on extended vacation and are returning at a later date according to their original departure date. will be coming,” he said on Twitter, adding, “Further rescheduling is unrelated to the holiday break.”
One group of travelers from Quebec boarded a plane belonging to the NFL’s New England Patriots after repeated flight cancellations by Sunwing.
Marie Prude, a resident of the Saguenay-Lac-Saint-Jean region of Quebec, said: global news She was traveling to the Dominican Republic as part of a family of 14. She was told that the shuttle bus that was supposed to take her home on her original flight on December 27th did not pick her up and that the flight was canceled after she made the payment to the airport.
Sunwing brought the group back to the airport on December 29th, but after waiting 12 hours, the flight was canceled again. The group was eventually repatriated on Dec. 30 on a plane belonging to an NFL team, Global News reported.
Meanwhile, some domestic passengers traveling on Sunwing had to find other means to return home.
Patrick Gobert, who lives in Prince Albert, Saskatchewan, told the Canadian Press that nearly a dozen people traveling with him had to drive home on New Year’s Eve after Sunwing was stranded in Calgary, Alberta. said it didn’t.
The group was scheduled to fly to Mazatlan, Mexico on December 9, 2022 and return to Saskatoon on December 23, 2022. Gobeir said Sunwing continued to delay her return home until December 30, when she was finally able to board the plane. Little did he know, however, that he would not be returning to Saskatoon until he noticed the Calgary tag on his luggage.
He said the plane’s Sunwing staff had promised him vouchers for group hotels and meals in Calgary and secured transportation to Saskatchewan. After that, I finally booked my own room. When they returned to the airport the next day, the Sunwing staff promised that a manager would come to assist them.
“Suddenly they left behind and we were left there,” said Gobeir.
On January 3, Liberal MP Peter Siefke, chairman of the House Transportation Committee, said: Said He has asked Sunwing Airlines and Via Rail to explain what caused the “unacceptable delays and cancellations” during the holiday.
The Canadian Press contributed to this article.
Andrew Chen is a reporter for the Epoch Times based in Toronto.