While on a short routine flight between Quebec City and Toronto a passenger falls asleep and wakes up on a dark, empty plane.
Air Canada passenger Tiffani Adams was on a short 90-minute flight between Quebec City and Toronto Pearson International Airport when she fell asleep.
Upon waking up, she found herself all alone on a dark empty plane, freezing cold and with no means to contact anyone.
The incident happened aboard Air Canada flight #1799 from Quebec City to Toronto Pearson on June 9, 2019, according to aviation website One Mile at a Time.
What happened when she woke up?
When she woke up Tiffani discovered that she was the only person on board the aircraft and to make matters worse the plane wasn’t even at the gate but at some remote location for overnight parking.
To set the scene for you picture yourself aboard a 200 seat Airbus A321 and you wake up still strapped into your seat, freezing cold and in the dark.
The first thing you do when you realize you are all alone is to try and use your mobile phone to call for help. This is exactly what Tiffani did only to discover that her battery was nearly dead and that there was no way to charge it, as the aircraft’s power was turned off.
Passenger rescued by luggage cart driver
Eventually, she stumbled upon a torch and was overjoyed about being able to see where she was.
Now with a source of light, Tiffani went back into the cabin and figured out how to open the main exit door.
With no gangway or steps, Tiffani was faced with what she described on Facebook as being a “40-50 foot drop to the ground.”
The actual height from the bottom of the main exit door near the cockpit on an A321 is just 3.39m (11.12ft) to the ground according to Airbus.
While perhaps not as high as Tiffani thought, it is still high enough to put you off trying to hang and drop from and even more so given the fact it was dark.
Now waving the torch around in the hope that someone would see her Tiffani got the attention of a luggage cart driver according to National Public Radio station NPR.
What happened after she got home?
Now, having been rescued, an Air Canada employee offered to drive her home and later called two times to apologize. On the telephone, the Air Canada representative assured her that they were launching an investigation to find out how she could have been left alone on the aircraft after all the passengers and crew had gotten off.
Now obviously traumatized by what had happened to her Tiffani posted on Facebook that she is still recovering from the incident. “I haven’t got much sleep since the reoccurring night terrors and waking up anxious and afraid I’m alone, locked up someplace dark,” she wrote.
Resources:
https://www.aircanada.com/ca/en/aco/home.html
https://www.npr.org/2019/06/21/734930475/a-travel-nightmare-waking-up-cold-and-alone-in-a-darkened-plane
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