72 Passengers Forced To Spend Hours Inside Diverted KL-SG Flight Due To Bad Weather
The Firefly flight from Subang Airport was forced to land at Senai Airport in Johor, where the passengers were not allowed to disembark after its attempts to land at Seletar Airport in Singapore failed twice.
By Sadho Ram — 30 Jan 2023, 12:41 PM
A Firefly plane carrying 72 passengers and four staff onboard had to be diverted due to bad weather yesterday morning, 29 January
The flight, FY3124, departed at 7.20am from the Sultan Abdul Aziz Shah Airport in Subang for Seletar Airport in Singapore, where it was scheduled to arrive at 8.40am. However, its attempts to land there failed twice after the Seletar Airport control tower did not give the plane permission to land due to bad weather conditions.
It had to be then diverted to Senai International Airport in Johor.
A video taken by one of the passengers showed the bad weather conditions with zero visibility outside as the flight circled above the Seletar Airport before being denied permission to land.
While the plane safely landed at the Senai International Airport, the passengers were not allowed to disembark and had to spend two hours inside the plane before it departed for Singapore at 11.17am
One of the passengers said that before being diverted to Johor, the captain of the flight had made two announcements to prepare for landing in Singapore, according to 8world News, a Singapore-based media outlet.
When the flight landed in Johor, the cabin crew handed out mineral water, biscuits, and peanuts to passengers, who had to remain onboard.
During the two hours, many of the passengers had to line up to use the toilet, and one of the passengers, who was travelling with his baby, had to walk back and forth along the aisle to comfort the baby.
The report stated that while the captain had announced that the estimated flight departure time back to Seletar Airport would be at 10.30am, the flight only took off almost an hour later.
The flight arrived in Singapore nearly three hours behind schedule
The airline has not released any statement about the incident.
Screenshot of the Firefly plane's route after it departed from Johor for Singapore.
Image via flightradar24