Nearly eight hours in a waiting room? Seems the boy and his Mom should have at least $27k coming there way from United for this one.

Boy, 9, forgotten at Chicago Airport

A nine-year-old boy was forgotten in a Chicago airport waiting room Saturday for nearly eight hours after an airline representative failed to put him on a connecting flight, the Ottawa Citizen reported.
Julien Reid was headed home to Ottawa on a United flight after visiting his dad in San Francisco, a trip he makes about six times a year.
He left San Francisco at 6 a.m. and arrived at Chicago's O'Hare International Airport at 11 a.m. He was supposed to catch a connecting flight from Chicago to Ottawa at 1:50 p.m., which would have put him in Ottawa at about 4:45 p.m.
His mother, Genevieve Harte, checked online and saw that Julien's flight was delayed until 5:35 p.m. When she arrived at the airport to pick him up, she noticed other passengers had disembarked but that her son was nowhere to be found.
Then she got a call from Julien, using his own pre-paid cell phone.
He said he was still at the Chicago airport in a "tiny, little room cramped with kids," where they played the same video on a loop all day, the Ottawa Citizen reported. The only food he'd been given was McDonald's, but Julian is a vegetarian. He said the other children were yelled at to "stop being kids."
Harte, 36, asked Julien to put her on the phone with the United attendant who was watching the children. That's when the attendant let it slip that no one had come to fetch Julien to put him on his connecting flight, she told the Ottawa Citizen.

 

27K....HA! More like an apology and a "$300 voucher anywhere United flies". No tarmac delay here. A nine year old and a connection? His parents are more brave than I.

 

I find it more sad that people do this to their children.

 

Airlines can be fined up to 27K per passenger for exceeding 3hrs on the tarmac. The money doesn't go to the pax



Airlines Face Big Fines for Delays - WSJ.com

 

Totally agree, mom and dad can't seem to stand eachother to even live in the same timezone, let alone country..... kid pays the price for mom/dad going on as if nothings wrong..... oh that's right, it's United's fault

 

There is nothing sadder than the Friday/Sunday afternoon/evening flights with the divorce UM shuttle.

 

Some one has to check the facts in this story, just sounds like a regional pilots life to me. Stuck in a small room all day waiting on a flight, playing the same video game over and over, eating McDonalds, mommy calling to check on you and the chief pilot coming in and yelling at you to stop being kids..........the $27,0000 seems a bit high......is this some flight schools regional traing program?????

 

+1

Used to see the same girl every other fri/sun on my old commute. We all knew her name and her dad's name on sight, and they knew all gate agents by name too.

really sad for the daughter.

 

Talk to some therapists and you'll hear that they've got an increased number of patients coming in saying they were sexually abused on flights as minors flying between divorced parents in the last ~10 years which was unreported.

Don't put your kids on planes alone if they're too young, the F/A's aren't baby sitters. It's not cheap, but why take the chance?

 

How much revenue actually comes from allowing UM's on your flights vs the Liability if something happens to the Kid?