LAHORE: Two flights – one of a foreign and other of a local airline – left for their destinations after more than 12-hour delay at the Lahore airport on Sunday, with the difference that the passengers of the foreign one were informed about the delay beforehand, while those of the local private one had to be on tenterhooks all along.

According to the airport officials, Saudi Arabian Airlines flight SV-373 was to leave for Jeddah at 1.30pm on Saturday, while Shaheen Air’s NL-149 was to leave for Karachi at 4.30pm. The Saudi flight left for its destination at 6am and Saheen’s around 5am on Sunday.

Most of the Shaheen Air 150 passengers reached the Allama Iqbal International Airport at 3pm on Saturday as its management did not inform them beforehand about the delay. Those of the Saudi flight reached the airport on the scheduled time as they were informed about the delay.

“It is our worst traveling experience with any private local airlines as its staff kept us giving new timings for departure after every hour,” a passenger said who wished not to be named.

He said the passengers, including women and children, remained stranded for nine hours before the management announced flight’s departure. “The plane took off after 1am but returned to Lahore soon afterwards because of inclement weather,” he said, adding they were not offered any food or drinks by the management during their stay at the airport after getting boarding cards.

The affected passengers lodged a protest against the airline and demanded the Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) to take action against it for causing so much inconvenience to them.

“An airline must inform passengers beforehand in case there is a delay and the CAA must ensure this,” the irritated passenger said.

The CAA, however, claimed the airline had provided meals to the passengers.

A number of PIA flights got delayed for several hours last month which included Lahore-Riyadh, Karachi-Lahore, Lahore-Karachi, Dubai-Peshawar, Peshawar-Karachi, Lahore-Manchester, Madina-Lahore and Jeddah-Karachi flights.

Sources said the PIA, in case of delay, offered food and night stay to its passengers going to Western destinations, but often ignored those traveling to Gulf.

PIA spokesman Aamir Memon told Dawn that the national flag-carrier had introduced an automated SMS system that informed its passengers three days prior to any flight delay on “operational ground”.

“Even we inform our passengers at the eleventh hour in case there is some technical issue,” he said, adding the PIA provided meals and night stay only if a flight developed a technical fault.

CAA spokesman Pervez Georg said: “The CAA ensures that all airlines properly take care of their passengers. In case of delay, the airlines are supposed to provide meals,” he added.

To a question about imposing penalty for not following the CAA guidelines, he said it often did so on different grounds.

Published in Dawn, August 3rd, 2015

On a mobile phone? Get the Dawn Mobile App: Apple Store | Google Play