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Sleeping Woman Left on Plane for Three Hours

Don’t ask me how this happened, but apparently a sleeping passenger was left behind on a United Express flight for more than three hours after the plane had landed. According to Ben Mutzabaugh at USA Today, the flight landed a bit after midnight, and the woman remained aboard in peaceful slumber until a cleaning crew came onboard around 4:00 a.m.

Must have been quite a surprise for the cleaning crew, huh?

Aside from the weirdness of the story, there’s a legitimate safety issue here as well. Why wasn’t the plane properly cleared before crew left for the night? What if this person wasn’t sleeping, but hiding? I’m not an alarmist by any stretch, but it seems rather sketchy that someone could dodge the crew and then have the plane to his or herself. Fortunately that wasn’t the case here.

But for United, the incident is yet another embarrassing gaffe. In fact, this isn’t even the first time United abandoned a passenger this year. Just this past April, a blind woman was left behind by the flight crew she thought was going to help her off the plane. She was sitting in her seat waiting for someone to escort her to the gate when she heard the cabin door seal shut. Two maintenance workers found her a few minutes later during an unscheduled cabin check.

Readers, how would you feel if you woke up on a plane at 4:00 a.m.? And what the heck is going on at United? Leave a comment below with your thoughts.

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