Passengers aboard an Air New Zealand flight were given the ride of a lifetime after their plane was forced to make a 16-hour U-turn once officials were informed operations at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport (JFK) were suspended.
US media reported the New York-bound flight had already been in the air for eight hours when flight staff was alerted to a power outage at JFK that would make their landing impossible as officials were already struggling to get a handle on their flight backlog.
Included on a list of flights that were ultimately unconfirmed for landing at JFK Airport, pilots reportedly attempted to find other US airports the plane could land at to no avail.
Messages from the cockpit showed how pilots asked the plane to be diverted to Houston, Texas, where passengers could transfer to domestic flights, or wait in hotels before continuing on to JFK Airport. A second failed request also saw pilots inquire about possibly making a quick pit stop and crew change in a different US city before continuing on to New York.
“Everyone on that plane would have much preferred to be in any airport in the US, to say nothing of Newark or LaGuardia right in the same general area,” Bryan Gottlieb, a traveler aboard the headache-inducing flight mishap, told US media.
“This is certainly the worst travel experience I’ve ever had, but ultimately, these things do happen, and I always try to keep in mind that none of the people I’m interacting with had anything to do with the decisions that delayed me — they’re all just doing their best and they were legitimately kind.”
Gottlieb told the outlet the he himself wasn't made aware of the U-turn until the flight was about three hours from landing backing in New Zealand's Auckland capital.
A spokesperson for the airline, however, defended its decision to return to Auckland, saying that "diverting to another US port would have meant the aircraft would remain on the ground for several days, impacting a number of other scheduled services and customers."
Chaos at JFK Airport began after the major travel hub encountered an electrical panel failure in Terminal 1 that had been prompted by a since-extinguished small fire that broke out overnight Thursday. The shuttered terminal serves various airliners including Aero Mexico, Air China, Lufthansa and Aeroflot, among others.