Calgary mother, son stranded in Phoenix after massive hailstorm grounds flights
Posted Aug 9, 2024 7:20 am.
A Calgary mother and her six-year-old son have been left stranded in Phoenix after a massive hailstorm hit Calgary earlier this week.
Monday night’s storm wreaked havoc on the north end of the city, including YYC International airport, damaging 16 WestJet airplanes and causing delays.
Jaclyn Szott and her son were scheduled to fly home Thursday, but have now been told their flight has been rescheduled to the weekend.
“I needed to get home,” she says. “My son and I bought a house, so I need to take possession of my house.”
“He has things, commitments this weekend, hockey camp starting, so I was like well, let’s see if we can get home a different way.”
The pair have been down in Phoenix since July 22 and Szott says the process in getting rebooked with WestJet has been an ordeal.
“I went to change my flight and it took me to the WestJet app, and it would let me look up flights,” she says. “But then every time I would go to select flights it would be red and it would say accept new itinerary, so I couldn’t change the flight.”
In a statement, the airline says they “sincerely apologize” to guests whose travel plans have been impacted by the damage caused to their planes in the wake of the severe weather.
“Our guest support teams are currently managing high volumes and are working to support guests as quickly as possible,” reads the statement.
WATCH: Passengers face waiting game in Calgary after hail damages WestJet planes
Szott says the company has provided her and her son with $120 in food vouchers, but they can only be redeemed at the airport in Phoenix and only on Aug. 9, a day before their flight. She says this experience has her rethinking flying with WestJet in the future.
“My experiences with them over the last year have just completely declined to the point where I will now actively look at other airlines and not book WestJet,” she says. “This isn’t the first time that something has happened where I’m just not seeing the customer service that WestJet used to be known for.”
The carrier said 84 of its flights were cancelled Wednesday, with 106 cancelled Tuesday and 58 on Monday.
The Calgary International Airport was also forced to close parts of its domestic terminal for repairs for an undetermined time.
