While airlines can constantly mishandle luggage, they usually have the decency not to forget the passengers who arrive on time at the gate. However, not at Southwest Airlines. The Dallas-based carrier left two blind passengers behind at New Orleans International Airport last month. To react to a five-hour delay, Southwest rebooked every other passenger onto an earlier service. The airline never made a verbal announcement of the change.
The two blind women, Camille Tate and Sherri Brun, waited out the entire five-hour delay at Gate B6 while checking the Southwest Mobile App for updates. Their fellow passengers boarded the earlier flight at Gate B4, not too far away. According to WSVN, the two friends didn't realize anything was wrong until they were the only two passengers on their flight. They still made the discovery faster than the airline. Southwest didn't discover the error until the flight landed. Southwest reasons that because they didn't rebook, the app never made them aware of the other flight.
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Airlines Don't Have An Excellent Track Record For Treating Passengers With Disabilities Well
Southwest apologized for their blunder, offering $100 vouchers for future travel along with explaining that they weren't eligible for full refunds because they completed the flight. Tate and Brun want Southwest to re-evaluate how it accommodates passengers with disabilities. The airline's statement to WOFL reads:
"We apologize for the inconvenience. Southwest is always looking for ways to improve our Customers' travel experiences, and we're active in the airline industry in sharing best practices about how to best accommodate Passengers with disabilities."
Airlines don't have an excellent track record for treating passengers with disabilities well. In 2023, Frontier Airlines damaged the wheelchair of a professional tennis player on his way to a tournament. In 2022, American Airlines damaged a single passenger's electric wheelchair twice in one month. The Biden administration eventually enacted new USDOT regulations to require airlines to reimburse passengers for wheelchair repair or replacement. However, the airlines sued earlier this year to amend the rule. With a different administration in the White House, one can assume their opinion on the consumer protection rule is likely to be much different.
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