Delta Airlines has announced that it will compensate each passenger on board the flight that crashed and flipped upside down in Toronto.
The crash resulted in the plane bursting into flames and one of its wings snapping, ultimately flipping the aircraft upside down. Passengers left “hanging like bats” from their seats. However, all 76 passengers and four crew members survived. Twenty-one individuals were taken to the hospital for treatment.
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How much is Delta Airlines offering?
The US airline giant promised a $30,000 goodwill payment to all 76 passengers, totalling $2.3 million. Delta spokesperson Morgan Durrant reassured passengers that the financial compensation is “no strings attached and does not impact rights.”
The offer comes as multiple agencies, including the Transportation Safety Board of Canada, the National Transportation Safety Board, and the Federal Aviation Administration, investigate the circumstances surrounding the crash.
“All these pilots train for these conditions. They fly under all kinds of conditions at all of the airports in which we operate. So, no, there’s nothing specific with respect to experience that I’d look to,” Delta CEO Ed Bastian told CBS News.
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Notably, at approximately 2:13 p.m. on Monday, one air traffic controller can be heard saying, “This airplane has just crashed.”
“Just so you’re aware, there’s people also walking around the aircraft there,” one individual stated.
“Yeah, we’ve got it,” another responder replied. “The aircraft is upside down and burning.”
Several passengers have since shared their ordeal
“We hit the ground, and we were sideways, and then we were upside down hanging like bats,” Pete Koukov, a passenger returning from a ski trip, shared. He described feeling “lucky and happy” to embrace fellow passengers and friends after the ordeal, per CNN.
Another passenger, John Nelson, told CNN that the plane “went sideways and… we skidded on our side and flipped over on our back.” He added, “When we hit, it was super hard.”
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“I did notice the winds were super gusty. The snow had kinda blown over the runways. So coming in, it was routine but it was noticeable that the runways were in kind of a weird condition.” He recalled, “There was a big fireball on the left side of the plane.”
