Passengers Roast on Grounded Plane

Passengers were trapped in a scorching hot airplane when the London-to-Newark flight was diverted in Connecticut because of bad weather, and regulations grounded it there. The plane’s generator cut out, leaving the 300 people on board without air conditioning on a 100 degree summer day. Some people on the Virgin Atlantic flight fainted. Eventually, “people were yelling and screaming,” one passenger said. After a two hour delay in London thanks to generator problems and then New York City-area thunderstorms forcing a diversion, once the plane reached Connecticut’s Bradley Airport, the pilots had exceeded their maximum flight time and couldn’t take the passengers home. Bradley Airport is unequipped for international arrivals, so passengers had to wait for Immigration and Customs officials to arrive—two more hours of waiting. Worse, local hotels were booked because of a golf tournament. Passengers boarded a bus to Newark at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday, almost 12 hours after they had been scheduled to arrive there.