LOS ANGELES, July 6 (Xinhua) -- A Hawaii woman claimed that she was forced to hold her 27-month-old son on her lap for three and half hours after United Airlines gave the toddler's seat to a standby passenger.
According to Hawaii News Now reported Thursday, Shirley Yamauchi, who is working in Kapolei Middle School of Hawaii, said she took her 27-month-old son Taizo to Boston in east U.S. on June 29. When they boarded the flight after 5 hours layover in Houston, another passenger showed up, claiming the seat of the toddler as his.
Yamauchi complained to a flight attendant that she bought the seat for about 1,000 U.S. dollars three month ago, but the latter only shrugged and said the flight was full, then walked away.
Yamauchi later told Hawaii News Now she thought about the incident happened in April that an Asian passenger was dragged from United Airline's flight.
"I'm Asian. I'm scared and I felt uncomfortable. I didn't want those things to happen to me," she said.
Five days after the flight, the airline finally issued an apology.
A spokesman for the airline explained that because gate agents inaccurately scanned Taizo's boarding pass, their system showed him as not checked in, so his seat was released to another passenger.
"We are refunding their tickets and providing compensation as a goodwill gesture. We are also working with our employees to prevent this from happening again," the spokesman said.
