Passengers onboard a Spirit Airlines Flight headed to Dallas, that was diverted to Tulsa, where it sat on the tarmac for over three hours, are opening up about the nearly 17-hour journey to Dallas.
“Every message we would receive from the flight crew would change minute by minute,” Alain Laforest, one of the passengers onboard said.
The flight left New York’s LaGuardia International Airport around 2:00pm on Thursday and was scheduled to arrive in Dallas by 5:00pm local time. But Spirit Airlines says severe weather at DFW caused the flight to hold and eventually the decision was made to divert to Tulsa.
In a statement the airline said in part:
“As a result of long ground delays in Dallas, our flight Crew was legally required to be put on rest and therefore no longer allowed to continue to Dallas.”
On the ground in Tulsa, passengers say they were kept on the plane for hours.
“People got nervous, people got agitated,” Laforest said. “There were kids bouncing off the walls, dogs peeing, people shaking and crying honestly,” he continued.
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After being let off the plane around 9:00 p.m., Spirit Airlines says buses were called to take passengers to Dallas. But Laforest and two other passengers opted to instead rent a car, arriving in Dallas at 5:00 a.m. on Friday.
“I ended up driving for five hours with people I’ve never met before,” Laforest said.
Spirit says it has offered a refund and $100-dollar voucher to all passengers onboard the flight.
