Summary Lucie Bahetoukilae was scheduled to travel from Newark, New Jersey, to Paris.
SAN FRANCISCO (Daily Dunya) - A Paris-bound French woman landed in San Francisco after United Airlines failed to notify her of the flight’s last-minute gate change.
Lucie Bahetoukilae was scheduled to travel from Newark, New Jersey, to Paris on April 24, but was bewildered when she ended up in San Francisco even though her ticket clearly said "Newark to Charles de Gaulle."
Bahetoukilae who speaks only French says that the airline neither email her about the change to the departure gate or made the announcement in French at the airport.
However; when she went into the plane after getting her ticket scanned by the gate agent, she found another passenger on her seat.
She notified the flight attendant about the issue who checked her boarding pass but didn’t point out the error. Instead, she was directed to another empty seat.
The mishap sent Bahetoukilae on a 7.5-hour flight in the wrong direction. She then had to wait for another 11 hours at San Francisco airport to get a flight home. In total, she spent more than 28 hours trying to reach her initial destination.
United airline while taking responsibility of the incident issued an apology.
"We deeply apologize to Ms. Bahetoukilae for this unacceptable experience," United said in an emailed statement to Fox News. "When she arrived in San Francisco, we ensured she got on the next flight to Paris and refunded her ticket. Our customer care team has reached out to her directly to ensure we make this right. We are also working with our team in Newark to prevent this from happening again."
