Hundreds forced to stay the night on planes after Delta flights diverted

• Delta Air Lines is apologizing to nearly 300 passengers who were stuck on their planes for about seven hours overnight last Thursday. The passengers were on two planes that were diverted to a regional airport without any border or customs officials.
• Since the flights had come in from Mexico, the passengers had to wait until the customs issues could be sorted out.
• Delta says it will issue refunds to the affected passengers.

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Delta Air Lines is apologizing to hundreds of passengers for a travel nightmare that left them stuck on their planes overnight on the tarmac. The incident affected almost 300 passengers in total.

Two planes had taken off from Mexico on Thursday, April 10, for Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. The impacted flights were Flight 1828 from Cabo San Lucas and Flight 599 from Mexico City. But, due to bad weather, the flights were forced to land at Montgomery Regional Airport in Alabama at around 10:30 pm local time.

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However, since Montgomery is a regional airport and not an international airport, the airport does not have any U.S. Customs and Border Protection facilities or agents.

What happened?

The passengers were then forced to stay on their planes overnight. A Delta spokesperson said flights from international points of origin must arrive at an airport with Customs and Border Protection staff for processing and that this was not possible until early Friday, April 11.

Passengers sat on their planes until about 5:30 a.m. the next morning, or roughly seven hours, before they were allowed in the terminal. Once inside, they were confined to one gate area, as Delta tried to arrange a flight to Atlanta.

Lauren Forbes told WCVB that she and other passengers waited several hours, until about noon, when they finally boarded a plane to Atlanta.

Delta said it plans to refund each customer’s ticket. The airline also said it fell short of how it serves and cares for its customers.