Ordeal of a Biman flight
On December 16, 2011, I was waiting to board Biman to fly from Dhaka to Chittagong. Flight BG 611 was to leave for Chittagong at 10:30 am. The ground staff got us on the bus at 10:25 am and then at 10:29 the Assistant Manager came and informed us that the air space had been closed for the Victory Day Air Show and the high officials' security. We accepted the fate of being stuck and were told that the flight would take off at 12:30 pm.
At around 1:15 pm there was still no announcement. We all went to the Manager's office. We were then told that our flight was cancelled, and now we were flying to Chittagong on the Hong Kong flight and there would be delay as the Kolkata passengers were not here yet. We asked where had the Kolkata passengers come from. They informed us that the transit passengers were to go to Hong Kong on Biman via Dhaka and they rerouted the flight via Chittagong for us. After a lot of arguments and confusion, we boarded the flight and the Hong Kong-bound passengers boarded the plane too.
When the Kolkata transit passengers boarded, it was already 2:40 pm! They then announced a delay of 30 more minutes for Kolkata passengers' luggage to be loaded. This was the flight that was to land in Chittagong from Muscat at 8 am. They rerouted it to Dhaka due to fog and since then all these passengers had been waiting for the flight without any food!
We finally took off at 3:17 pm.
The passengers of this flight ranged from social elites to the uneducated labourers who send remittance and keep our economy going. I wish our leaders would hear the cry of millions who they have taken for granted.
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