Cabin crew member working first flight causes five-hour delay after opening plane door
The first day on the job is always bit stressful, especially when you make a mistake. But few have had as disastrous a time as one new member of the British Airways cabin crew, who reportedly caused a five-hour delay to a flight after mistakenly opening the plane door.
The cabin crew member was working her first flight out of Heathrow Airport in London when the accident happened, leading to the emergency slide being deployed just as the aircraft was about to set off.
The incident happened on Sunday afternoon (11 June), The Sun reports, moments before the Airbus A350 was due to begin its journey to Austin, Texas.
When the door was opened and the slide activated, emergency services raced to Terminal 5 to attend what they thought could have been an urgent situation happening on Flight BA191.
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The aircraft was soon surrounded by firefighters and police due to the unfortunate error.
Passengers onboard were then faced with a delay lasting five hours as a new emergency slide had to be installed in the aircraft and a new plane deployed.
The plane was towed back to the stand and engineers removed the deployed slide form the tarmac.
The crew member was reportedly ‘stood down’ from her job after her faux pas and sent back to training.
British Airways said in a statement: "The aircraft returned to stand and customers disembarked normally.
"We arranged a replacement aircraft for them to continue their journey the same day and have apologised for the inconvenience caused."
The aircraft will be examined by engineers and will return to operation when it’s deemed safe and fit to fly.
LADbible has contacted British Airways and the Met Police for a comment.
This is not the first time a new BA employee accidentally deployed the emergency slide before take-off.
Back in January, an unnamed new employee was working their first flight on a Boeing 777 from Heathrow when a similar incident happened.
He inadvertently triggered the plane’s evacuation procedure by opening an escape door at Heathrow Airport.
The passengers on board the BA75 flight to Lagos, Nigeria were informed that the slide situation would lead to their journey being delayed for four hours.
A substitute aircraft completed the journey to Lagos with the same crew, except the rookie, who was replaced.
In a statement shared with LADbible at the time, a spokesperson said: “The aircraft returned to stand and customers disembarked normally.
"We've apologised to customers for the inconvenience caused, have provided them with refreshment vouchers and have arranged a replacement aircraft so that they can continue their journey as planned.”
Gregory Robinson