Tag Archives: southwest airlines

Airline ticket sale – too hot for servers

Sotuhwest Airlines - Photo Credit: Morguefile.com
Southwest Airlines – Photo Credit: Morguefile.com

By Jennifer Keiper, WLS News

Southwest Airlines is having a 3-day ticket sale – but – good luck buying a ticket.

Yestedray, customers who tried to book Southwest flights online reieved a “System Alert” message with instructions to call an agent.

We rtied again, today, and the same emssage is popping up.

But now, Southwest has a note on their website that apologizes for any difficulty customers may be experiencing.

Turns out that high demand has slowed the system, and Southwest says it’s working on the issue and extending the sales through Friday.

 

Copyright @2015 WLS News

Woman suing Southwest Airlines after slipping out of wheelchair at Midway Airport

(CHICAGO) A woman who slipped out of a wheelchair being pushed by a Southwest Airlines employee at Chicago Midway International Airport in May has filed a lawsuit against the airline and the city of Chicago.

Rosemary Hastings filed the negligence lawsuit Thursday in Cook County Circuit Court.

On May 17, Hastings was being assisted by a Southwest employee while boarding a flight from Midway Airport to Washington, according to the lawsuit.

The employee was pushing her wheelchair down the jetway to the airplane when she began to slip and asked the employee to stop, the suit claims. But the employee did not stop the chair and Hastings was injured.

The lawsuit claims Southwest was negligent because employee pushed the wheelchair forward down the slope of the jetway instead of backing down, and proceeded with the wheelchair at a high rate of speed. Hastings also claims the employee failed to maintain proper control over the wheelchair and did not keep a proper lookout for her safety.

The lawsuit also claims an unreasonably dangerous condition for wheelchair traffic exists at Midway, and the city has failed to remedy the situation, constituting a “conscious disregard for the safety of passengers in wheelchairs at Midway International Airport.”

The two-count lawsuit seeks an unspecified amount in damages.

The city has not yet been served with the suit, said city Department of Law spokesman John Holden, who declined to comment on it Thursday evening.

A representative from Southwest Airlines also declined to comment on the suit.

Southwest fined $1.6 million for tarmac delays at Midway last winter

(Chicago)  Federal officials Thursday fined Southwest Airlines $1.6 million for trapping passengers on the tarmac on 16 flights at Midway Airport for more than three hours last January.

The fine is the largest civil penalty ever imposed by the U.S. Department of Transportation for violation of tarmac-delay rules, the Sun-Times is reporting.

Those rules ban airlines from holding domestic flights on a tarmac for more than three hours without giving passengers an opportunity to leave the plane. Exceptions are allowed only for safety, security and air traffic control issues.

Federal officials contend Southwest experienced tarmac delays of more than three hours on Jan. 2 and 3, 2014. A malfunction of the crew scheduling system and an unexpected staff shortage hurt the airline’s ability to clear aircraft from its Midway gates, according to a statement from the U.S. Department of Transportation.

In addition, a “severe weather event at Midway” contributed to delays, the agency said.

Chicago was hit with a snow storm on Jan. 2, 2014, followed by temperatures so low on Jan. 6 and 7 the period was dubbed “Chiberia.”

— Chicago Sun-Times

© Copyright 2015 Sun-Times Media, LLC