A passenger onboard a recent Flair flight to Toronto described moments of panic after the captain declared an emergency, oxygen masks dropped from the ceiling and the plane made a sudden descent.
“I thought I was going to die – sitting next to my partner was the only comfort,” Toronto resident Bhagya Ramesh told CTV News Toronto. “It felt like the best-case scenario would be to land in the Gulf of Mexico.”
The Boeing 737, operating as F82615, departed Cancun on Feb. 7 for Toronto at approximately 8 p.m.
After reaching cruising altitude, Ramesh said the plane began to travel through turbulence that was “different from what a regular traveller expects on a flight.”
“The turbulence was pulling us down, and then the lights in the cabin dimmed,” Ramesh said.
Soon after, she said an announcement came over the intercom asking the cabin crew to prepare for an emergency descent and oxygen masks released from above.
Ramesh said the crew “paced up and down the aisle with their personal oxygen tanks.”
“The babies on the flight cried and screamed as the parents struggled to get the oxygen masks on them,” she said.
Another passenger on the flight uploaded a video to Twitter of the incident, in which they can be seen wearing an oxygen mask amidst commotion.
“No one knew what was actually happening, and the majority of us were convinced we were either going to die or land in the Gulf of Mexico,” Ramesh said. “I was under the impression we were going down.”
“Many passengers put on their life jackets despite receiving no clear instruction to do so,” she continued, adding that she witnessed flight attendants soon follow suit.
The general mood, according to Ramesh, was split between "resigned acceptance and panic."
Around 35 minutes after the pilot declared an emergency, Ramesh said the passengers received word from the pilot that the cabin had depressurized, and that the flight would be redirected to land in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
“The passengers clapped in relief,” she said, adding when they landed in Fort Lauderdale, about 30 minutes later, she saw “a few passengers crying.”
When reached for initial comment, Flair Airlines told CTV News Toronto Friday that the safety and well-being of their passengers is their “highest priority" and that they've offered full refunds for the flight, baggage, and incidentals to customers.
Of the emergency landing, spokesperson Mike Arnot said the crew “responded ably, and the flight landed without further incident.” The company also underlined that the descent, while unplanned, was only slightly faster than the rate of descent a plane might make under normal circumstances and that the passengers were safe throughout.
“Passengers were provided with accommodations and food, and re-accommodated on other flights on [Feb. 8 and Feb. 9] by Flair Airlines for their return to Toronto,” Arnot added.
GETTING HOME
Ramesh and her partner, however, were not flown home by Flair.
“I was on the phone with Flair agents the next day from 9 a.m. until 4 p.m.,” she said. “They had apparently booked us on a flight going to Kitchener-Waterloo, not even our destination of Toronto."
But, later that evening, just before midnight, correspondence from Flair, reviewed by CTV News Toronto, shows Ramesh was informed her flight to Kitchener-Waterloo had also been canceled, and that they had not been rebooked on another flight.
“We sent numerous urgent emails regarding this to see what recourse we had and how we could get home, we received no emails back and no calls,” she said.
Finally, Ramesh said she and her partner booked with Air Canada to get home, costing them an extra $500. As of Monday, she said she hadn’t received any reimbursement or clarity on when she could expect it.
When asked about the discrepancy Tuesday, Flair Airlines said they reviewed the correspondence, and believe a misinterpretation by the customer service agent working on Ramesh's case was to blame for the cancellation.
The company apologized for the additional inconvenience and offered to reimburse Ramesh and her partner for their Air Canada flights as well.
Flair said 69 passengers on F82615 flew home on Feb. 8 to Toronto, and 74 passengers flew on Feb. 9 to Waterloo.
Back in Toronto, Ramesh said she’s glad to be home, but that “Flair had nothing to do with [them] getting back.”
“I’m deeply troubled that this airline stranded us and then gave statements to the media to say we were booked back because that's not true,” she said.
“This isn't a situation we wanted to be in, and I'm sure [Flair] is up to their neck in emails, but if they had time to issue a statement that all passengers were taken care of and flown home, they had time to get back to the people that had to find their own way home and are still waiting on compensation.”
