"Northwest Detroit Passengers Delayed Nine Hours"

Wednesday, December 13, 2000

Passengers Delayed Nine Hours


EAGAN, Minn. (AP) -- Northwest Airlines apologized to passengers who were
shuttled on and off a plane three times over nine hours because of
mechanical problems -- before their flight was canceled altogether.

Frustrated passengers stuck in Detroit used their cell phones to call 911 on
Monday and tell emergency dispatchers they wanted off the plane, said
passenger Barbara Lefebvre, 45, of Milwaukee.

``They held us hostage,'' said Patty Mackay, 42, of Milwaukee. ``They kept
lying to us, saying to us we were going to leave. And we never did leave.''

Any problem at Detroit sets off alarms for Northwest, which has worked to
rehabilitate its customer service reputation since stranding 6,240 travelers
on its planes there -- some for more than eight hours -- during a Jan 2,
1999, snowstorm. Northwest now has a policy that passengers not sit on
grounded planes for more than three hours.

Northwest apologized to the passengers Tuesday and gave them $200 each to
cover expenses for the previous night, plus a free round-trip ticket. And
passengers who missed connections to cruise ships were flown at Northwest's
expense to ports where they could join their ships.

Flight 997 bound for Miami was set to leave Detroit at 10:25 a.m. Monday
with 139 passengers.

After the initial delays, blamed on a broken defogger on the cockpit
windshield and a generator problem, the pilot decided at around 8 p.m. that
freezing rain wouldn't allow a safe takeoff, said Andrea Newman, vice
president for state and local affairs for the airline in Detroit.

And once the passengers reached the gate, they were met by police because a
passenger had made threatening remarks, Newman said.

To compound the situation, gate agents mistook the problem as a weather
cancellation. Airlines aren't obligated to pay expenses for stranded
travelers, and many passengers slept at the airport.

Newman said Northwest agents should have offered hotel rooms, transportation
and food for stranded passengers. Northwest's guidelines say it pays
expenses for passengers it inconveniences by mechanical problems.

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