Continental Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines and Mesaba Airlines fined for stranding passengers on board plane

For the first time, the United States Department of Transportation (DOT) has fined 3 US-based airlines for leaving the passengers stranded in an aircraft on the tarmac.

The action by the Department of Transportation is bound to have widespread impact on the airline sector as also on the efforts to get passed a passengers Bill of rights in the United States Congress.

The US Department of Transportation ordered Continental Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines and Mesaba Airlines to pay fines totaling $175,000 for their roles in the incident in which a Continental Express flight sat on a tarmac at Rochester International Airport in Minnesota for what the DOT calls “an unreasonable period of time” on August 8, 2009.

The 47 passengers were stranded aboard the plane at night on the airport tarmac for almost 6 hours.

The flight in question – Continental Express Flight 2816, operated by ExpressJet Airlines, the regional partner of Continental Airlines – was on its way from Houston Airport to Minneapolis-St Paul Airport on August 8, 2009.

Owing to bad weather, Flight 2816 was diverted, and it landed in Rochester International Airport at 12:30 a.m.

Employees of Mesaba Airlines, who were the only personnel at Rochester International Airport at that time, informed the crew of the ExpressJet fight that the passengers cannot be allowed to enter the airport terminal since there was no official from the United States Transportation Security Administration (TSA) on duty to screen the passengers.

Following this, all the 47 passengers were forced to remain inside the packed-to-capacity plane from 12:30 a.m. till 6:15 a.m. in the morning, when they were allowed to enter the airport terminal.

Continental Airlines and its regional partner ExpressJet Airlines are both based in Houston, Texas, the United States.

Mesaba Airlines, a regional airline based in Eagan, Minnesota, the United States, is a wholly owned subsidiary of Delta Air Lines. Mesaba Airlines operates flights for Delta Air Lines and Northwest Airlines, under the name ‘Delta Connection.’

The fines imposed by the US Department of Transportation on Continental Airlines, ExpressJet Airlines and Mesaba Airlines have been welcomed by the critics of airlines, who have been persistently urging the United Stats Congress to adopt a ‘passengers Bill of rights’ which will require a plane to return to the airport terminal if a plane is delayed by more than 3 hours on the tarmac.

Kate Hanni, founder of FlyersRights.org – a website which advocates a Bill of rights for airline passengers – said the fine clamped on the 3 carriers “is not only a first” but also the fine of $175,000 is “dissuasive enough that US-based domestic airlines will really have to think about their behaviour before putting passengers in harm’s way.”

The US Department of Transportation, she added, appears to be willing to protect the airline passengers and “we are grateful for that.”

In a statement, Continental Airlines said it will pay the fine in order “to avoid costly litigation,” adding that ExpressJet Airlines had indeed strived to release the  passengers from the plane much earlier but it could not do so since the crew of Mesaba Airlines “gave out false information.”

John Spanjers, president of Mesaba Airlines, said his company “operated in good faith” by providing voluntary ground-handling assistance to the ExpressJet Airlines flight while it stat on the tarmac.