British Airways London flight to Germany mistakenly goes to Scotland, Mar 2019

[margarita25]

Stop!! You're making me LOL all over again!

ETA: And this is serious business I'll have you know!

I’m really mad about this Jim_M, lol!

—-

So who screwed up here? Who’s specific duty is it to file the flight plan??

 

[JDG]

Its kind of frightening that the pilot, co-pilot and crew didnt know the destination. IMO

Not at all amusing.

 

[margarita25]

Its kind of frightening that the pilot, co-pilot and crew didnt know the destination. IMO

Not at all amusing.

This is seriously messed up!

 

[JDG]

The worse thing we ever 'suffered' on a plane was when we went to Montana and some luggage was re-routed to Denver.

We've been on a plane when the pilot decided to de-plane and people got upset that he wouldnt fly the plane after a bird hit. Gee, if the pilot won't fly, would you complain?? Not me.

 

[Jim_M]

Its kind of frightening that the pilot, co-pilot and crew didnt know the destination. IMO

Not at all amusing.

You gotta admit this was plain silly. That cockpit crew knew they were going to Scotland. Just no one else knew it.

 

[JerseyGirl]

Revealed: Why a British Airways flight to Germany accidentally landed in Scotland

For this flight, BA contracted WDL Aviation, a small German airline that does a fair amount of flying for British Airways’ London City base.

British Airways will have specified to its sub-contractor, WDL, the pattern of flying for the day. Looking back over the past week, that plane has flown almost exclusively between London City and Germany – mostly Dusseldorf but also Frankfurt.

That’s a logical assignment because, while some passengers may be mildly miffed to find themselves on a non-BA plane, at least the crew was German-speaking.

But BA, as the customer, can deploy the plane wherever it wishes, and on Sunday 24 March, the day before, it flew Dusseldorf-London City-Edinburgh-London City-Dusseldorf.

It is reasonable to conclude that someone picked up or emailed the wrong day’s flying programme, and the mistake wasn’t noticed.


Has anyone offered to help BA avoid the same problem again?
Yes. Ryanair is helpfully sending a copy of Geography for Dummies to British Airways.

Will passengers get any compensation?
Yes. Everyone on the original flight, as well as those on the remaining London City-Dusseldorf-London City flights (at least three more of them, delayed by up to five hours because of the problem) is entitled to €250 (£215) in compensation.

 

[JanetElaine]

I would have loved to see the expressions on the flight crew's faces when they realized what had happened. The flight attendants probably wondered why all these Germans were going to Scotland.

I'm laughing so hard at y'all, I'm crying LOL

 

[JanetElaine]

On a serious note, beside all the problems mentioned by others, it's a good thing they had enough fuel for the (wrong) distance. Edinburgh and Dusseldorf are pretty much the same distance so it wasn't a problem here. I would hate for this mix-up to happen on flights where the correct destination is much closer than the goof destination... sure passengers would have noticed the duration by then and likely told a flight attendant, but still.

 

[human]

Remember when the pilots were going to Minneapolis, I think, and went further because they were on their laptops?

I have to look it up

 

[human]

I think the airline stewards said something to the pilots.

Northwest Airlines Flight 188 - Wikipedia

 

[JanetElaine]

I think the airline stewards said something to the pilots.

Northwest Airlines Flight 188 - Wikipedia

Bloody 'ell.

 

[CoverMeCagney]

Apology?? You sent them to the wrong freaking country!!

They didn't even manage to leave the country!!

 

[CoverMeCagney]

I would have loved to see the expressions on the flight crew's faces when they realized what had happened. The flight attendants probably wondered why all these Germans were going to Scotland.

Oh that's made me chuckle so much!!

 

[cybervampira]

Oh that's made me chuckle so much!!

Hey, we go Whiskey touring all the time!

 

[JerseyGirl]

I think the airline stewards said something to the pilots.

Northwest Airlines Flight 188 - Wikipedia

others....

Warnings went unheeded in wrong-airport landing at Ellsworth
As Delta Flight 2845 soared west above eastern South Dakota at 7:50 p.m. on July 7, 2016, the pilot forewarned the co-pilot about mistaking Ellsworth Air Force Base for their intended destination, Rapid City Regional Airport.

Tanzania AIB details Ethiopian Boeing 767 wrong airport landing incident - ASN News
The Tanzania Air Accident Investigation Branch issued a preliminary report on the wrong airport landing incident at Arusha, involving an Ethiopian Airlines Boeing 767.

 

[human]

Back a few years ago Air France pilots drank wine with their meals while flying. They don’t consider wine a big deal.

International rules put an end to that practice.

 

[PrairieWind]

I seem to recall and incident several years ago where the two pilots fell asleep and overshot their destination. They had to turn around and back track. Anyone remember that?

ETA: So while searching to find the story about the pilots falling asleep, I find that there are a LOT of instances of the pilots falling asleep and missing their destinations! Good grief!! I guess an alarm clock should standard equipment as well.

 

[Herat]

Yeah.

That was in 2008. On a morning flight from Honolulu, BOTH pilots for the local inter-island company Go Airlines (no longer in business ) in Hawaii fell asleep and overshot their destination of Hilo, Hawaii on The Big Island. The pilots ignored almost a dozen calls from ATC controllers over the span of 17 minutes.

The FA’s noticed the plane was 15 miles past their destination heading out to open ocean when they should have been preparing to descend.

Had they n0t been awakend and realized their mistake, they could easily have run out of fuel and had to ditch in the wide open ocean, quite far from rescue.