Crew wrongly accuses passengers of stealing security guard's phone, flight grounded for 88 minutes
A Wizz Air flight from London to Tirana was delayed for 88 minutes after staff falsely accused passengers of stealing a security guard’s mobile phone.
A Wizz Air flight was delayed by 88 minutes on Friday after staff mistakenly accused passengers of stealing a security guard’s mobile phone, resulting in a tense standoff on the tarmac at London Luton Airport, reported People. The flight was set to depart at 3:10 PM, heading for the Albanian capital of Tirana, but passengers were told the plane would not take off due to a missing phone.
According to cabin crew, CCTV footage had allegedly shown a passenger taking the phone at the airport, prompting the crew to inform passengers that they would not be allowed to leave until the phone was recovered. An announcement made just before the flight's scheduled departure stated: “We know the phone is on board, now we should leave in two minutes – we cannot because of this, this is a security issue. We cannot have an item that does not belong to anyone on this flight. We cannot depart knowing that there’s something that does not belong to this flight.”
Sparks backlash
One of the passengers, a 28-year-old who requested anonymity, criticised the lack of security and the delay in resolving the issue, saying, “You’d think airports would be more secure and this would be resolved much more swiftly. You’re not even safe at Luton airport, somewhere you think is a safe space.”
The situation escalated when a second announcement was made nearly an hour later, stating that the crew was reviewing CCTV footage in search of the alleged thief. The cabin crew member addressed passengers, saying, “We still want to give the chance for this potential person who made the mistake to bring it before they will find it in the video. Once again, please voluntarily come to the front or to my colleagues at the back.”
As the delay continued, police boarded the aircraft to investigate. However, after over an hour of confusion, cabin crew finally announced that there was, in fact, “no item” on the plane at all. They explained: “There’s no item on this plane, we’re happy now with our security position to go. I appreciate your understanding for this situation. It is for us as well quite a new one, we’re doing our best and we will be on our way to Tirana very soon.”
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