A Delta Air Lines flight attendant’s mishap has cost about $70,000 and delayed passengers for hours.
He accidentally deployed the emergency slide as the scheduled Pittsburgh-Salt Lake City flight left the gate ahead of take-off.
This wasn’t a rookie mistake by the crew member – he reportedly has three decades experience.
Preparing the door for departure, he mistakenly triggered the emergency power assist response which automatically deploys the slide.
The slide was deployed against the aerobridge so passengers couldn’t deplane until maintenance staff were called to detach in manually.
Due to the mishap the flight was delayed about four hours.
This caused some passengers to miss connections in Utah and had to be accommodated overnight.
The airline said passengers were ‘rebooked on other Delta flights to their destination later that evening or the following morning.’
The flight attendant ‘apologized and was quite flustered’ one passenger told the media.
Delta is conducting an investigation into the weekend incident.
