A good way to end the week on a humorous note.
Thanks to a comedy of errors due to a double goof-up by both passengers and airline Air India Express, four passengers from Bangladesh landed up in countries and cities far away from their destinations.
Air India’s low fare subsidiary Air India Express operates a flight from the Bangladeshi capital Dhaka to Bangkok, Thailand via Kolkata.
On board were four passengers, Lokman and Nargis Akhtar who were destined to Bangkok, and D Moni and E Moni who were destined to Delhi.
The Akhtars who should have stayed on board and continued to Bangkok, mistakenly got off at Kolkata, while the Monis who should have disembarked and connect to the Kolkata Delhi flight stayed on board.
On disembarking, the Akhtars waited in a queue to undergo a H1N1 swine flu check. By the time they cleared the screening and ground officials realised the mistake, the plane had already taken off for Bangkok.
Why was the error not detected one might ask? Simple answer, the passenger head counts matched; remember the Monis had to disembark to connect to Delhi. Two passengers got off all right, just not the right two.
To fix this goof the airline has sent the two Bangkok-bound passengers, the Akhtars, back to Dhaka and assured them that they would be flown to the Thai capital this Sunday. In parallel Air India delayed its Bangkok-Delhi flight by 45 minutes to bring back the Monis who wrongly flew on.
As if this was not enough, the Monis were not even original Air India passengers. They were booked on the Jet Airways Dhaka-Kolkata-Delhi flight which was cancelled thanks to the ongoing sick-out at Jet and accommodated on Air India.
Thanks to inputs from the Times of India.
Have a great weekend.