Passengers encouraged to sue after spending hours stuck on planes at YVR during snowstorm

An air passengers’ rights advocate is encouraging travellers to launch a class-action lawsuit after they were forced to sit in packed airplanes on the tarmac at the Vancouver airport for up to 12 hours during Monday night’s snowstorm.

Gabor Lukacs says what happened was a violation of Canada’s Air Passenger Bill of Rights.

“The law is the airline has to allow passengers to disembark after three hours on a tarmac, and possibly three hours and 45 minutes if departure is imminent,” said Lukacs. “After that – certainly after four hours – passengers have an absolute right to get off. That right was violated.”

The advocate added passengers also have a right to reasonable quantities of food and beverages, and that right was also violated.

In a statement, Air Canada said the long waits at Vancouver International Airport this week were unavoidable. The airline said jet bridges froze and the heavy snow limited carriers’ ability to tow their aircraft to and from gates, creating gridlock and making de-planing the passengers on the tarmac impossible.

“Some people were onboard aircraft for significantly longer periods than expected. While not desirable, having customers remain on aircraft was the only safe option during such a situation,” the statement read.

Lukacs said he doesn’t believe there was no way to get those passengers safely off the plane. “It would have been difficult, it would have required maybe more money, more resources and the airline has to incur those expenses,” said Lukacs, who also argues those passengers should never have been allowed to board in the first place.

”Aircraft should not be leaving the gate, especially if there’s a storm coming without a back-up plan of what happens if they cannot take off and passengers want to get off, as per the law,” he said. “Keeping people for 10, 12 hours on a plane, that’s completely unreasonable.”

The advocate also suggested the treatment of passengers amounts to forcible confinement.

Lukacs expects the airlines will face financial penalties from transportation regulators, and said passengers would have a good case for a class-action lawsuit.

“They should sue the airline for general damages, for inconvenience, for stress, for being kept without food and water for a long time,” Lukacs said. “They should enforce their rights, and they should be seeking very significant amounts.”