Broiled at Bradley

Windsor Locks became Windsor Lockup for these passengers:

Blame game over stranded passengers
Plane was grounded at Bradley for hours

Updated: Thursday, 24 Jun 2010, 6:36 PM EDT
Published : Thursday, 24 Jun 2010, 3:18 PM EDT

* Mark Davis

Windsor Locks, Conn. (WTNH Channel 8, New Haven, CT)

– Hundreds of passengers were stuck on a hot airplane for four hours this week at Bradley. The airline blames the airport, but state officials say it was the airline’s fault.

The Virgin Atlantic flight from London to Newark was diverted to Windsor Locks Tuesday night around 8:30pm. The A340-600 aircraft was carrying 300 passengers and 14 crew members. The passengers were stuck on the plane until about 1am.

With nearly 150 flights diverted through Bradley last year, Gov. Jodi Rell (R) fired back at Virgin.

“We’ve had dozens of flights that have been diverted into Bradley, international flights, some involving customs, some did not, obviously. We’ve not had one problem, not one,” she said.

A Virgin Atlantic spokesman has told the Associated Press that it took more than two hours for customs agents to arrive. Today the Commissioner of the DOT, Joe Marie, flatly denied that.

“Customs officials showed up within 45 to 50 minutes and we started processing people through customs,” he said.

Marie says it was Virgin Atlantic, and its pilot, that made the decision to keep the plane on the ground without letting passengers off for more than three hours before calling for customs.

“This flight sat on the ground for three hours here, under Virgin Atlantic’s control, before anything was done,” Marie said.

Marie says the airline wanted to continue the flight as soon as the weather allowed and only called for customs when the pilot’s legally mandated time in the cockpit ran out.

“Virgin Atlantic had every intention of continuing this flight on route to Newark, to land their passengers in Newark because they were going out bound that evening with another load of three hundred passengers, so it was in their interest to get to Newark,” he said.

Meanwhile customs officials are denying the pilot’s allegation that customs threatend arrest if passengers were allowed to deplane.

Rell says she wants a formal investigation completed — fast.

“I’d like to have it by next week in complete detail on exactly what happened,” she said.