This weekend, passengers traveling from Abu Dhabi to San Francisco on Etihad Airways Flight 183 had to endure a horrific ordeal. Massive fog rolled in and shut down Abu Dhabi International Airport. Etihad wouldn't allow the passengers to get off the plane, even when the plane ran out of water. They were marooned on the tarmac for a staggering 12 hours before finally taking off on a 16-hour flight to San Francisco. The plane finally arrived at 6:30 pm on Saturday. I wrote about this last night at Liberal America, and I've been chewing on this all day. This is unacceptable. Period.
Had this happened in the United States, Etihad would be facing more than just a black eye to its reputation. Since 2009, airlines have been barred from leaving passengers on the tarmac for more than three hours on domestic flights and four hours on international flights. Any longer than that, and the offending airline would face fines of up to $27,000 per passenger. Airlines are also required to provide adequate food and water during delays. However, those rules don't apply to foreign carriers overseas.
The current American regulations were based on European rules for stranded passengers. You would think that basic decency would make this the rule worldwide. Apparently that isn't the case. Sounds like it's time to make this the standard internationally. I'm trying to find out who we need to contact in order to make this happen ... not sure if it's the International Air Transport Association or the International Air Transport Assocation. But we need to contact somebody. No one should have to endure what those people endured in Abu Dhabi.