Can you believe an airline losing track of a kid? Losing track of luggage is one thing but this is ridiculous!!!

http://www.msnbc.com/news/601174.asp

I feel sorry for her. That was gross neglegance by America West, and they should be punished somehow. Does the FAA have procedures for punishing an airline if this happens?
I could see if her flight was late and she missed her connection, but to be flying to DTW and end up at MCO? Geez guys, I wonder what they were on that day..Anyway, I'm glad she got where she was SUPPOSED to be..

Was there any form of compensation offered/given? Not that any conpensation could make up for that..

Chris

Just so everyone knows, the child was a non-rev standby pax travelling on an employee buddy pass.

Jmc1975 wrote:

Just so everyone knows, the child was a non-rev standby pax travelling on an employee buddy pass.

And does that exscuse it????

Chris

Not taking the full blame away from HP, but didn't this kid hear the boarding announcements and the F/A preflight announcements saying the flight was going to MCO??

She's what? 11??? Most kids that age don't listen to the announcements, as they really wouldn't know what they mean..They rely on the F/A and such to get them to the right place..

Chris

She has obviously never flown before. She doesn't listen to the announcements, she should have at least noticed the announcements onboard the plane. Of course the airline gets blamed for something that wasn't really their fault.

What surprised me is that America West didn't fly the girl from MCO-DTW non-stop on NW, instead of making her do the connection ALL OVER AGAIN

Chris

I don't excuse this, and think it is utterly horrible,but HP was trying there best to become a better airline, and this just kills that. My regards go to the family of the child, that i am sure was scared as hell.

I would like to reitterate that the child was flying as a non-rev. Her flight (America West #561) arrived into Orlando on-time at 7:20pm and Northwest's last flight (#443) to Detroit departs at 7:30pm. Flying the child back through Las Vegas was the only alternative to putting her up in a hotel in Orlando. That way, America West could have full jurisdiction. She was also flown first class the whole way back, which is not customary for non-rev minors. It is true that this incident should not have happened in the first place but America West made every effort to rectify the situation and get her as quickly to Detroit as possible. Now that the press is harping on it, it now just sounds like a case of a disjointed family trying to cash in on the moment of temporary fame and fortune.

zYa thats no good.. AMerica West.
Hmm If canada based Westjet comes over and take some bits off America WEst that would be quite something to see.. hmm..

I just felt I needed to chime in on this one.

It is unfortunate that this happened and from what JMC said America West did do a decent bit to correct the situation. But airlines from time to time do lose track of unaccompanied minors. This incident is certainly not isolated.

Rather than comment on the situation itself, I have to say what a fine example of objective journalism this is. I mean, really. What is this guy on? Just about every sentence of that article goes straight against common rules, not to mention the rather doubtful choice of words as such.

Just as an example, look at the last line:
(...)the airline did lose her luggage, but it too finally turned up in the right place.
So they "lost" it how?

Very discomforting piece of "journalism"...

Best regards,

TriStar.

im sorry but at the end of the day its American West fault-that child was intrusted in their care. i think its a case of f/as not paying attention.

its not up to us to judge on how the parents life their lives and its not upto us to say they are disfunctional-what this is is a reaction of AW fans trying to spin the story from the mistakes of their airline and in the following report i dont see any blame on the child and paying $60 dollars for your childs safe passage is a cheek.

Airline loses 11-year-old girl on chaperoned flight
July 16, 2001 Posted: 10:41 PM EDT (0241 GMT)from cnn.com

DETROIT, Michigan (CNN) -- AmericaWest Airlines is investigating how an 11-year-old girl traveling with an airline chaperone from Los Angeles to Detroit wound up on the wrong flight, arriving 18 hours late.

William McDaniel of Detroit said his daughter, Aunnalise Woods, was put on a plane by her mother in Los Angeles on Saturday evening. She was to arrive at Wayne County Metropolitan Airport on a connecting flight from Phoenix, Arizona, at 6:40 p.m. EDT, McDaniel told CNN.

When she didn't arrive, an attendant told him his daughter was flying standby and would arrive at 10 p.m. on the next flight, but she wasn't on that flight either.

Woods' mother, Alacia Blake, who lives in Los Angeles, had paid AmericaWest a $60 fee for an airline chaperone to accompany her daughter to and from her connecting flights to Detroit. But the attendant put his daughter on the wrong connecting flight in Phoenix, McDaniel said.

"She brought it to the attention of the attendant. He told her this was the right gate. She recognized she was on the wrong flight when the plane landed and the pilot welcomed everyone to Orlando."

Jim Sabourin, vice president of communications at the airline, said a station manager in Orlando had tried to contact the father, but had only a pager number, and no one returned the page. McDaniel said no one contacted him.

Without parental consent, AmericaWest could not put Woods on another airline that had a direct flight to Detroit, Sabourin said. So Woods was flown on an AmericaWest flight that connected through Las Vegas. That flight arrived in Detroit at 7 a.m. EDT Sunday, more than 18 hours after her original flight left Los Angeles.

McDaniel said his daughter was in tears on the plane and now does not want to fly alone.

McDaniel said no one from AmericaWest could tell him where his daughter was until 3 a.m. EDT, and that representatives at the company's Phoenix headquarters were rude to his family when they called trying to find daughter's whereabouts.

The airline is also looking into those claims, Sabourin said.

"This is an unfortunate situation," he said. "There are literally thousands of minors who travel by themselves on airplanes every year, and this is an extremely rare occurrence."

Normally, a chaperone accompanies a minor throughout his or her flight to their destination, taking the minor to the outgoing gate.

"We're uncovering all the details to determine exactly what happened to prevent it from occurring again," he said.

McDaniel was given a ticket voucher for $400 by the AmericaWest attendant at Metro Airport, but said he has contacted an attorney to pursue legal action.

Sabourin said the airline has still been unable to contact McDaniel, but would like to refund the price of the child's ticket and give each of Woods' parents free tickets and a vacation package, in addition to the $400 ticket voucher

How do you know she was non-rev? If she had been a non-rev, it seems to me the employee who gave it to her would have been highly involved in finding her rather than leaving it to the parents to call Phoenix HQ in the middle of the night. My guess is that the non-rev angle is the story that employees keep repeating to themselves to somehow justify it. I ditto Airlinelover's comments--soooo what! A child was lost. And the final insult was sending her back to Las Vegas because that didn't have parental consent to send her direct. That sounds like CYA to me, and it brings up another point... how dysfunctional is this company that it can't put together a panicking family with a panicking girl? Truly a case of the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing.

Excuse me - but who in their right mind send an unaccompanied minor on a nonrev ticket???? That is IMHO a highly irresponsible act in the first place, especially when a connection is involved. I can't beleive thet HP would accept her in the first place as such... most airlines would flatly refuse her for travel without positive space.

It would be hard to collect damages since the original price of the service was free--and she suffered no real damage. However, I suppose you could go for emotional distress, etc...

All airlines have paper work which must be filled out/signed by anyone having contact with the UM. The f/a who accepts the UM signs off on the paperwrk from the agent. I know I check all my paperwork before I sign off on it..especially when I am the custodian of a child. Also the agent escorting the child should have made sure they were taking the child to the right flight/gate. And also at the end of the flight when the f/a turns the UM over to another agent or parent or who ever is meeting the child paperwrk is signed again. The persons whose name is on the form should be the one to pick up the child or that child will not be released. It is all very specific and to the letter.
Also the child should have noticed when they said....good evening welcome onboard flight 123 to Orlando.
The child and HP are both at fault here. Neither the child nor the agent were paying attention to what was going on. And dont tell me that a 11 year old deosnt know the difference between MCO and DTW.

I heard also that when the kid was in MCO they would not let her make phone calls to tell her parents where she was.

Being lost by the agents has happened to me once before.

However definiately not as bad as being put on the wrong flight. Many years ago I was travelling Perth to Jakarta to see my Dad on Sempati Air. When we arrived in Jakarta, the F/A in charge of us yelled from the top of the stairs to one of the gound staff in charge of putting the passengers onto the buses that we were UM's and to take care of us or whatever. She handed us the envelope and the ground staff told us to get on the bus. When the bus started I looked if that woman was getting on the bus and she didnt. So I thought maybe that is where the UM service ended.That is where they left us so we realised we were doing it alone and went throught the terminal finding our way, got to customs and started to do all the stuff when a group of groundstaff came running throught the terminal looking for us.

They must have realised losing the UM's was a big deal as there was a few of them and they were running. Probably because of the paperwork signature requirements, but if that wasnt there I rekon they would have left us.

Just a mild story compared to the one above, but thought I'd let you all know it does happen.

Why anyone would send their child across the country by themselves is senseless. Blame the parents...

This isnt the first time this has happened and it doesnt excuse it, the thing is now the press is really looking at every F......up any airline makes and they love a case like this. Clearly more than 1 person is at fault here, everybodys blaming the attendant but what about the gate agents who look at the boarding pass? I hate to say this specially regarding a fellow employee but I would fire the responsible person -s, this is totally unacceptable.
Now if she was on a buddy pass Im not sure if the family has a chance to receive compensation because on the back of it it basically says you are on your own ,BUT this case is different being an unaccompanied minor so im not sure how liable HP is, but I REPEAT there is no excuse.
I ll probably get some critisicism for the following but its possible.
What if I need some quick money and my kid is traveling by him-her self and plan the whole thing out,
a plan that a 12 year old could easily understand and carry out, get my point.
Hey i belived that lady in carolina when she said she didnt drown her kids a few years ago.

???Hello??? Addi375, Were you listening to ANYTHING that has been said?

You wrote:

Also the child should have noticed when they said....good evening welcome onboard flight 123 to Orlando.
The child and HP are both at fault here. Neither the child nor the agent were paying attention to what was going on. And dont tell me that a 11 year old deosnt know the difference between MCO and DTW.

Did you see what Go Canada! wrote???? This is from the article posted..

Woods' mother, Alacia Blake, who lives in Los Angeles, had paid AmericaWest a $60 fee for an airline chaperone to accompany her daughter to and from her connecting flights to Detroit. But the attendant put his daughter on the wrong connecting flight in Phoenix, McDaniel said.

"She brought it to the attention of the attendant. He told her this was the right gate. She recognized she was on the wrong flight when the plane landed and the pilot welcomed everyone to Orlando."

So you see, she DID point it out, only to be told she was on at the RIGHT gate, when clearly she was NOT.
And to blame the CHILD for what happened, are you  ?

Also, from the same article:

Without parental consent, AmericaWest could not put Woods on another airline that had a direct flight to Detroit, Sabourin said. So Woods was flown on an AmericaWest flight that connected through Las Vegas. That flight arrived in Detroit at 7 a.m. EDT Sunday, more than 18 hours after her original flight left Los Angeles.

Sure, without parental consent. Sounds like a good exscuse to me. Citing regulations saying why they couldn't bring the situation to a better ending.. BTW, doesn't NWA codeshare with HP? Seems to me HP should have done a better job trying to contact the parents. I.E.. Information, Internet phone books, even local (MCO and DTW) law enforcement working together to bring this to a happier ending. God. I feel sorry for her. I can see why she'd be in tears..

And to top it all off,

Sabourin said the airline has still been unable to contact McDaniel, but would like to refund the price of the child's ticket and give each of Woods' parents free tickets and a vacation package, in addition to the $400 ticket voucher.

Yeah.. Sounds like a "please don't sue us" move to me.
And before I forget, Thanks Charlieduke for the support.

I'm probably gonna get reamed for this, but if someone did this to my little brother or one of my cousins, (all between 7-12 years old) they would pay dearly.

Chris

Wll I used to work for Continental many moons ago and there was this poor kid crying his eyes out with everybody walking past not even paying attention.

I asked the kid what was up I knew he was lost, So I asked him His Mother's Name

He answered Mommie

I asked him his fathers name

He answered Daddy

Well two seconds later A very paniced Rachel and Martian scooped thier kid away thanking me.

I guess the moral of the story is Yeah the airline is Accountable no question but I think in the moral light, A lot of these kids are....I almost wanted to say bratty but thats not the word so lets just say in there own frame of mind. But when I was a kid I made the trip from JFK to SFO a lot and my father drilled it into me what was expected now he wasnt a drill sergent about it but for the few minutes it took to arm me with what the essentials in air travel were saved me from hours of mishap. I agree the airline is accountable but that doesent mean we cant help our own cause and not let loopy things happen.

I can see blaming the parents or even the kid if they are traveling together and the kid runs off or something, when the parent isn't looking or something, but in this case, it is HP's responsibility.. Not the kid, not the parents..Remember, her Dad was at DTW and her Mom in California. (LAX I think).

I would like to agree with TriStar, the media these days makes everything into a circus...

America West loses track of child ... And you thought losing your luggage was bad

Phelllleeezzzeeee........

Not to minimize the effects on the family, but this sounds like it was more a case of airline employees making bad decisions. From what I can tell, America West did not LOSE a child, she didn't disappear in the airport did she?

Anything to sell a paper (or nowdays) to get you to a webpage.....

HP. isnt responsible for this, it was a mistake made by one of there workers so how could you say it is hps fault for something one person did? And also this person must be deaf not to here the flight announcements:

" This is flight ### with service to ---"

thats just my thoughts, have a nice day,

boeing 747-311

You bring up a good point in that but I guess there are so many opinions and points out there. I'm just wondering if the dad or mom gave the kid a last minute "What do you do if?" But it could very well be that no matter what happened this was bound to happen?

What do you think?

As usual too many ignorant people making comments on procedures they know nothing about.

HP once aware of their mistake followed proper procedures to get the child home.

Parents should know better than to have a child non rev alone during the busy summer travel season.

I agree that more moms/dads should do just that, give "What to do if" scenarios, but she may very well have, and remember. She asked the agent, and he said it was the right gate when it was wrong..

Chris

Another winner from AWA, America's Worst Airline.

Another 2 cents from ContinentalEWR. Why can't you just shut your trap! Your opinion of America West is legendary on this forum and everyone's got your number! Can you guarantee me that Continental has NEVER sent a child on the wrong flight?

To the poster who said it was not the airline's fault...it was one of their employees: Ha ha ha ha ha. Excuse me, but the employee was acting as agent for the airline, and the airline is therefore responsible for his or her action. That's just the way it is, Hoss.

To the folks who stated "the child was a non rev anyway." Maybe so, maybe not.....once the airline received $60 cash in had this child did, in fact, generate some revenue. If the airline was unwilling or unable to provide appropriate care for the child while enroute they should not have accepted her as a passenger.

The fact that this child was a non rev does not in any way diminish her value - there are weird and creepy people out there. The fact that this airline was so cavalier and unconcerned in the way they treated her (not to mention family notification) - well, all I can say is this one really takes the cake.

Was the journalism somewhat sensationalistic? Perhaps. Did HP really screw this one up, bad??? You bet they did.

That is true too, I missed that part of it i'll have to read it again.

My Bad.

The child should recoginize, "flight 123, with service to Orlando." and tell someone. But no.

Sorry Airline Lover, the above post was not meant towards you.  

See my post to Addi375

And to Dasheighty- No prob.

Chris

If they were so cavalier and unconcerned, then why did America West do their darnedest to get the girl to Detroit as quickly as possible, in first class and most importantly, in their jurisdiction? Once they figured out they were in the wrong, they were quick to resolve the problem. Remember, NW's last flight to DTW was 7:30pm, only 10mins after the Orlando arrival. America West did contact the father's pager, but how can you count the family as being a credible source when the father has only a pager as the sole form of contact? If you notice, all family members involved, the child, the mother, the father, the grandmother and the aunt all had different last names...we're not talking about the most intact family here, so I'm sure the communication broke down within the family as well.

Yes, I read those posts and you are correct.

The above post was to airline lover.

Sorry NW-ELITE, we both posted at about the same time, I think.. 1 min apart.. No harm done..  

Chris

Maybe this will get HP to staff MCO. CO currently handles HP in MCO and they really are bad to HP pax.

WOW!!! 41 posts that's a record for me!!!

Thanks!!!

Eric

I think the real story is the way the media is reporting the story. The aren't reporting how the kid or the family may have a role to play. I saw the father talking about how he was so upset that the airline didn't even call him to offer an explanation. He was also 'exploring' his legal options.

For the record:

FA's DO NOT handle UM's. They are boarded by a CSA, and when they arrive a CSA takes them off the plane and handles it from there. Let's not point the blame at the FA's, rather the CSA's.

They probably mistook her for a cabin crew member...

Ok, I've only read a few replies on here. First, it IS the airlines' fault for not getting this child on the correct aircraft. Unaccompanied children-even pass riders, are to be accompanied by an employee at all times while on their trip, so the airline must take the brunt of the blame.

In most cases when a minor gets misplaced-and it's happend on every carrier at one time or another, and will happen again, the family and/or the minor is well compensated, and should be. We once had a UM going CLE-MKE, and ended up in MCI. Our staff at MCI booked her, and paid, for a flight for her from MCI-MKE, had a CO employee go with her ( I think it was a supervisor), and in MKE, worked out compensation for the family, who was very impressed with how we handled the unfortunate circumstance.

It's unfortunate when this happens-it isn't "ridiculous", as the author says. To err is human, and, once the mistake is made, the airline needs to make amends any way it can.

"America West looses track of kid"!!! Once again the friendly press twisted words to make this much more interesting than it really is!!! They put her on the wrong plane that's all...they never lost track of her. Of course the family will now take advantage of this media exageration and get as much as they can from the company (American way???). The compensation the Airline offered to the family is more than enough for a non-rev messup. I don't know how many times I've flown non-rev and got bumped off, delayed, over night stays and what did I get? NADA!!! And I certainly didn't expect anything either!!! Concerning "She brought it to the attention of the attendant. He told her this was the right gate. She recognized she was on the wrong flight when the plane landed and the pilot welcomed everyone to Orlando." Well yeah, kids say a lot, strap her to a polygraph and let's hear the story again!!! Anyways, what 11 year old wouldn't be thrilled to find out they're in Orlando???  

I'm SICK AND TIRED of hearing about 'Fair compensation for a Non-Rev passanger'. Are you guys trying to say that that girl is only worth as much as a non-rev ticket? ($0, to be precise) Try telling her parents that. See how they respond..

Chris

Do flight attendants not sign for UM's? Why are the F/A's not at fault? The paperwork states the destination of the UM, the flight attendant, while not entirely at fault, was just one more safe-guard that failed.