As travelers, we are all used to delays. Sometimes it is weather so it is an obvious delay, sometimes it is a late incoming aircraft and sometimes it is crew related. They may have had a late connection or suddenly sick and calling in a backup – we have probably all heard it all!
Qatar Airways Flight 36 Delayed Due to Crew Being Stuck – in an Elevator
But, how about this one? On Tuesday, Qatar Airways flight 36 from Birmingham to Doha had a delay that was almost 4 hours long because the pilot and crew members were stuck in a temporary elevator for almost 3.5 hours. This happened at around 6AM and there were a total of 6 people stuck in the elevator. Firefighters arrived around 8am and were not able to finally get them out until around 9:30am, after an engineer was unable to get the elevator operating.
The amazing thing to me is that the crew went about their professional responsibilities right after this happened and were able to successfully deliver the aircraft and passengers to Doha. I would imagine that this was somewhat frustrating and even exhausting on some levels to be stuck like this so this is admirable that the crew went on with their job.
I was stuck in an elevator at JFK one time on my way up to take the AirTrain. There were three other people with me and it was only for a few minutes. The elevator was stuck between floors and the doors had not shut all the way. We were able to get them open and then I jumped out first and helped the other passengers up to our next floor. Definitely nothing like what happened to the 6 people in Birmingham this week! But, even for just a few minutes, one of the people with us already started to panic so I can imagine what it must have been like to be stuck for 3.5 hours.
However, Qatar didn’t appear to handle the situation on the ground so well during this delay. Apparently, passengers were given the equivalent of $10 in meal vouchers which wouldn’t buy much at the airport and the airport personnel had to move the passengers away from the boarding area during the delay. While this wasn’t Qatar’s problem, there definitely should have been more of a move to make it work for the passengers then and work out later who would end up being responsible for what had to be done for the passengers.
At least it turned out well in the end for the stuck crew! Now, maybe you can say you’ve heard it all when it comes to airline delays! 🙂
HT: Business Insider
