BENGALURU: Passengers on board the Thai Airways flight from Bengaluru to Bangkok heaved a sigh of relief on Thursday morning at 12.30 am when their scheduled flight finally took off. It was exactly 24 hours behind schedule for those who boarded Thai TG 326.
Issues to the engine as spelt out by the flight captain is cited by passengers as the reason for the fiasco. However, there has been on official confirmation from Thai Airways.
Jaideep Vaidya, a passenger told TNIE, “We took off on time (Wednesday, 12.30 am) and flew for about 20 minutes but the flight turned back after a bout of bad turbulence. The Pilot announced it was a technical problem. We landed at Bengaluru and the engineers tried to fix it for three to four hours before eventually saying it was not possible and cancelled the flight. We were all made to sit inside the flight when all this happened.”
Vaidya was to head to Bali from Bangkok.
Another flyer Aadya Sharma said, “Ten of us as a group were on board the flight and we were heading to attend a get-together. After the captain announced an engine issue and a return to Bengaluru, it was an ordeal for us. There was no air conditioning inside the flight at KIA and we were seated for hours in the stuffed atmosphere.”
The flyers were then taken by bus to the airport.
“Again inside the bus, we were made to wait for an hour before some technicality was sorted out. When we reached the immigration counter, there was literally no one from Thai Airways willing to take responsibility for the who fiasco. There was a complete lack of information and we were all simply stranded there standing,” Sharma added.
Many were visibly angry.
“Some had to attend important business meetings while a few were on a very short break,” he said.
"Airline officials simply refused to help when we tried leaving by other flights to Bangkok run by Indigo or Air India."
“Since it would be last minute booking on other flights, the fare was very high. However, they said we need to pay the fare and our original flight ticket and the excess fare could be claimed later. There was completely no help at all from anyone,” a woman passenger charged.
The flyers were accommodated at a nearby hotel for the night.