[UPDATED] CALAMITOUS RUNAROUND – Passengers slam airline's 'poor communication' during disruption

Scores of people turned up at the check-in counters of Caribbean Airlines Ltd (CAL) at Piarco Airport on Monday trying to find out whether their flights would be rescheduled after the mass cancellation of flights on Sunday.

In a statement on Monday, CAL said the cancellations came after 93 it received sick calls from 75 pilots on Saturday and Sunday, causing the airline to cancel 60 international and domestic flights.

CAL went to court on Monday and was granted an injunction against the TT Airline Pilots Association (TTALPA) by the Industrial Court. The injunction said TTALPA and its members were barred from taking part in or continuing industrial action and should report for duty as rostered, especially those employed by CAL.

CAL's statement said on receiving the calls, CAL, immediately, and at significant cost, wet-leased two aircraft, obtained accommodation for stranded passengers and took legal advice. It said the Port of Port of Spain assisted the airline’s domestic operations by adding a special ferry sailing which took passengers to and from Tobago.

Tamara Dennis from Rio Claro said she had been going back and forth from her home to the airport since Saturday to get a flight to Toronto. It had initially been delayed, and was then cancelled on Sunday. She said she had missed her connecting flight to Edmonton, where she was travelling on vacation with her seven-year-old daughter, and she didn’t know what would happen when she got to Toronto.

“You know how much people taking from here to St Helena? $80-$100, and then someone might take a $500 from St Helena to Rio Claro.

"They don’t care. We’ve been here since 2 am. I went to the counter and they said the flight was full so I need to wait until 2.30 pm to see if I could get on another flight.

"I haven’t been compensated in any way, no hotel, no food, no transport, no nothing. They have no remorse for the distance people are coming. It’s very frustrating, because it's like nothing is being put in place for people, and then they want to give you attitude.”

She said she had not received a call or e-mail from the airline about what was happening with her flight.

Jamaican passenger Shauna said she was travelling to Dominica with friends and the flight stopped in TT before going to Barbados and then Dominica, so the entire group was stranded.

“We landed here around 7 pm, and finally got to the Marriott Hotel around 2 am.

"They took us back to the airport this morning, but they just told us there’s no flight available, so they’re sending us back to the hotel.

"They were trying to send us on a flight to Barbados, but then we’d be stranded in Barbados. "There’s one flight at 9 pm tonight that we hope we can get on.

"I’m just waiting, I don’t know when the next flight will be.”

She said the airline representatives she encountered also seemed shocked by the situation and had no contingency plans in place.

A group trying to get to Barbados said they were supposed to leave TT at 9.55 pm on Sunday after arriving from Antigua. One woman said the first they heard of flights being cancelled was when they arrived at Customs and Immigration in TT, and they had received no e-mail communication from the airline up to Monday.

“From Customs, they told us go that way, go to the hotel, get something to eat. Little did we know it would be a four-hour wait to get to the Marriott, and we got there at 1 am. They told the people going to Guyana to be ready at 4.30 am, but no one told us we were also supposed to be on those buses.
"At the airport, we heard that the Guyana people were getting through but the Barbados flight was full. I don’t know full with who, but it’s full.

“We understand if you have issues with industrial action, that’s outside your control, but the least you could do is communicate better with the passengers.
"So you bring us out early to sit down for a flight that may or may not be scheduled for us. And I need to get home.”

A male passenger from Jamaica said he came in last week to go to the Summer Stage concert on Saturday, but his flight back to Jamaica had been cancelled. He said he was trying to buy a ticket to go to Tobago but had been told no flights were available.

“They keep saying they’re putting people in hotels and that’s a lie, people had to find everywhere else to sleep, in the airport, somewhere. I’m seeing people here two days now in the same clothes. If they had gone to a hotel, they would have changed.”

A group of 31 Tobagonians returning from a conference in Jamaica also had to find accommodation for themselves in Trinidad overnight. One man said the situation was ridiculous.

“They called me at 12.25 am to tell me I need to go to the port because all flights were cancelled. I told them I’m not doing it. I paid for a particular service and you’re supposed to give me that particular service.”

He said people on international flights were told to go to the port to use the ferry to get to Tobago.

“The guy asked how he was supposed to get there, and was told he had to find his own way. They told him to leave now or he would miss the ferry.
"How are we supposed to promote tourism if that’s the way we treat tourists?”

Another woman said she refused to use the ferry option, as she got badly seasick.

Passenger Karan Singh said he was travelling from upstate New York to Guyana to attend a wedding. He said his flight was supposed to be at 1 am on Saturday, but on his way to the airport he received a text telling him his flight was delayed.

“I live three hours from the airport, but I went anyway, because the flight was delayed for three hours. It was delayed twice more and finally cancelled on Sunday morning.

"They couldn’t get me on another flight until Thursday, so I spent two hours on the phone to get a refund, got a flight on JetBlue and arrived here at 5 am.

"It took us two hours to get to the counter. My connecting flight is 10 pm tonight, so I’ve been travelling for 48 hours, with 18 more hours before getting to Guyana.
"We’re on standby, so hopefully we get through today.

“They initially offered to fly me out on the 29th, which is when my return trip was originally booked for.
"I won’t ever fly Caribbean Airlines again. If they had said something before I got to the airport, I could have done something differently.”

Singh said no explanations were given for the delays other than what he saw on the news. He said he was travelling with his mother-in-law, who was using a wheelchair, and he needed to arrive in Guyana before his children, who were taking other flights and had never been to Guyana before.

People whose flights were scheduled for Monday were proceeding smoothly through the counter check-in process. Shedley and Giselle Branch said they had come to drop off their son, a student athlete who was returning to Jamaica for school.

“We just came today and met this long line. They’re trying to be organised, asking questions, ensuring that those who are travelling today are in the correct line, and those who may have been caught up in the issues over the weekend are being accommodated. We’re seeing staff asking questions, it’s just that it’s a lot of people.”

The team manager of the Barbados Badminton Association’s junior team, who were flying back to Barbados on Monday, said six team members had been scheduled to fly back to Barbados on Sunday, but were flying back on Monday. She said two members of the senior team had been scheduled to come to TT on Sunday to participate in the senior tournament on Wednesday, but it was uncertain when they would arrive.

This story was originally published with the title "CAL updates delayed, cancelled flights" and has been adjusted to include additional details. See original post below.

Caribbean Airlines Ltd (CAL) said it is continuing to work on recovery flights for displaced passengers of cancelled services resulting from severe flight disruptions on August 20, due to a high volume of sick calls from pilots.

In a release at noon on Monday, the airline said the process was ongoing due to the high number of individuals impacted.

It said some international and domestic flights for August 21 are still impacted and its dedicated Reservations Service Centre is actively working to contact all affected customers.

There are two delayed international flights. The first is BW527, JFK (New York) – GEO (Georgetown, Guyana) – POS (Port of Spain), which has been rerouted via Kingston, Jamaica (JFK-KIN-GEO-POS). It is expected to arrive in Kingston at 10:30 am local time, and leave at noon, to arrive in Georgetown at 4:39 pm local time.

The second is BW216/217, POS - BGI (Barbados) – OGL (Ogle International Airport, Guyana) – POS, which is expected to leave Port of Spain at 1:30 pm.

CAL said the remaining international flights remained cancelled. Customers were being contacted for flights BW43/439, BW521, and BW445, scheduled for Grenada, JFK, and Barbados respectively. Passengers on flights to St Lucia (BW 434/435 and BW 244) would be accommodated by charter via UVF airport in St Lucia.

On the domestic airbridge, CAL said BW1524/1525 was delayed, with an estimated departure time from POS at 4:45 pm and an estimated departure time from Tobago at 5:40 pm. All other Tobago flights remained cancelled.