IL - Pan Am flight 8 hours late

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Pan Am flight 8 hours late

By Kristi O'Brien / Staff Writer

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GARY - Micky Bertig and her husband took their first Pan Am flight last week from the Gary/Chicago Airport, hoping for a convenient Chicago alternative.

But Bertig says she will "never fly Pan Am again" after returning home eight hours later than scheduled on Sunday, and being offered no compensation.

Bertig, of Crown Point, was one of more than 50 passengers on flight 4232 who were delayed for almost seven hours at the Bellville, Ill., airport outside of St. Louis on their return trip from Florida's Orlando Sanford Airport.

Bertig was scheduled to land in Gary around 5 p.m. Sunday. Instead, she arrived shortly after 1 a.m. Monday morning by bus. She said she was also delayed an hour and a half trying to get to her Disney World vacation destination.

But Pan Am's mechanical delay was just part of the problem.

Runway lights at the Gary airport were out, forcing the replacement plane to land in South Bend, where passengers boarded a bus back to Gary.

John Nadolny, senior vice president for Pan Am, said Monday afternoon he had limited information about what happened.

He said he had been told the plane did not continue from Bellville to Gary because there were "weather-related, icing problems."

So the passengers, except those going to Portsmouth, N.H., were taken off the plane, and the plane then continued to Portsmouth, missing the Gary and Pittsburgh stops altogether.

Nadolny said he was unsure why the flight skipped Pittsburgh.

It could have been a problem with the de-icing equipment, he said, adding "if it wasn't up to snuff" the plane wouldn't fly in adverse weather conditions.

Though there were no apparent on-ground weather problems Sunday night in Gary, Nadolny said it's possible conditions were different at a higher altitude.

Roger Hruskovich, Gary/Chicago Airport marketing director, said about 2,300 feet of lights along the carrier runway were out because of a wiring problem. They were repaired on Monday. The lights reportedly went out around 7:30 p.m.

"This is a first-time occurrence," he said.

Bertig said she was mainly upset about her treatment from Pan Am officials. She said Monday she requested a refund, only for the return portion of her flight, but was told since she reached her final destination safely, a refund was not in order.

"(Pan Am officials) were nasty, rude and unprofessional, and then they don't even want to compensate me," she said.

Dawn Edelen, who owns Dawn's Diner and Catering in Valparaiso, said was upset for the same reason.

"I called them this morning and said I should be compensated for this some way, and the woman I talked to was rude and said I was delivered to my final destination."

Edelen said she did not return to Valparaiso until 2 a.m., which was too late for her to prepare to open at 6:30 a.m., so she kept her restaurant closed on Monday.

Pan Am officials did not return calls to comment on their reimbursement policy or the possibility of mechanical failures on the plane. http://www.post-trib.com/news/story2/index.html

-- Doris (reaper@pacifier.com), October 11, 2000


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