TORONTO, Ont. – The snow and cold weather caused delays and cancellations at Pearson International Airport on Saturday night into Sunday morning, with some passengers trapped on the tarmac for several hours.
“We landed at Pearson at about 9 p.m. Saturday and as soon as we landed, the pilot said it would be about a 15 or 20-minute delay before we could reach a gate,” said CityNews reporter Tammie Sutherland, who was returning from vacation.
“It was three and a half hours,” she said.
Sutherland said passengers were calm initially, but eventually became frustrated.
“We were told nothing,” another passenger said.
A third passenger said the pilot told him to complain to the airline, because there was “no reason” to be on the tarmac for so long.
Pearson is advising passengers to check their flight status before leaving home. Click here for the GTAA website.
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I flew out of Pearson Saturday night and was also stuck on the Tarmac for several hours. But there are legitimate reasons for delays and the staff aboard my Westjet flight were incredible in keeping passengers informed of the reasons. The pilot came on the PA system several times to amend timelines offer apologies and to give complete explanations. Besides all ground support vehicles taking longer to service the planes due to blizzard conditions, there was an emergency at the de-icing bay involving a fire. It only takes one or two small incidents to create delays in a very busy, tightly structured schedule. Delayed departures means delays in arrivals, making more delays. I drive a truck in Toronto, when there’s a storm, traffic gets backed up, but there’s nobody I can blame. So it took 5 or 6 hours to come home from the Carribean? That’s still pretty amazing in my book.