SINGAPORE: Passengers of Singapore Airlines (SIA) Flight SQ125 were left stranded at Kuala Lumpur International Airport on Wednesday night (26 Apr) after the flight was cancelled due to technical problems on the Airbus A350-900 passenger plane. Passengers waited at the airport for more than seven hours after a replacement flight was also cancelled.
The flight was scheduled to depart Kuala Lumpur at 8:40 pm and arrive in Singapore at 9:50 pm, carrying 159 passengers and 13 crew members.
Kristina Nicolas Rene, who was part of a tour group scheduled to take this flight to Singapore and then transfer to London, England, took to social media to complain about her experience.
Kristina recounted that when the passengers boarded the plane at 8:45 pm, the captain suddenly announced that the plane had a technical error. At 11:00 pm, the flight was cancelled, and the replacement flight scheduled to depart at 2:30 am on the 27th was also delayed for several hours before being announced that it could not fly.
As a result, some connecting passengers missed their flight to London, including Kristina and her tour group.
Revealing that the passengers were only given Starbucks meal vouchers at 11.30, three hours after their plane was supposed to take off, Kristina said: “From 11.30pm to 4.50am we were not given water to drink and we were clueless what is happening to our flight.
“We were stranded in KLIA airport 1 without any further info and we were not offered a place to stay at the hotel. We also missed our Singapore – London flight which was supposed to be at 11:45 pm.”
Expressing frustration with the airline’s lack of information and support during the ordeal, Kristina demanded a response from SIA to the “passengers who had trust and faith in your service”.
SIA has since apologized for the inconvenience caused by the flight cancellations and has revealed that the Airbus A350-900 passenger plane encountered a technical problem with the aircraft’s sensor system before takeoff.
It explained that the plane returned to its parking bay, and all passengers and crew disembarked as engineers needed more time to resolve the issue. It said that the affected passengers were put on an alternative flight, but this replacement flight was also later cancelled due to regulatory concerns.
The airline added that it provided meal coupons to the affected passengers to spend at Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Additionally, the company arranged other flights for passengers from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore on Thursday (27 Apr) and booked hotel accommodations for those affected.