A Canadian woman of Indian descent has accused Air Canada of negligence that resulted in her father’s death, who was 83, while on a flight from Delhi to Montreal.
In September, Shanu Pande, an Ontario native, boarded an Air Canada flight from Delhi to Canada with her father, Harish Pant. According to the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (CBC), Pant experienced severe medical symptoms seven hours later, during the long-haul flight over Europe. These symptoms included vomiting, back pain, chest pain, loss of bowel control, and the inability to stand up.
Pande then begged the flag carrier’s cabin crew to change course and land so she could get her father to a hospital.
Nevertheless, the aircraft continued on its intended path for an additional nine hours, passing over Ireland, the Atlantic Ocean, and Eastern Canada before arriving in Montreal, where paramedics were on hand. However, Pant passed away while they were treating him.
From Delhi to Montreal, the flight takes almost seventeen hours.
Pande said, “He was deteriorating in front of my eyes,” according to the report’s quote.
Pande said she had been anticipating the journey for years, as her father was finally going to travel from India to Canada with permanent residency status.
According to the report, she claimed that her father may have lost his life as a result of Air Canada’s failure to acknowledge his symptoms as life-threatening.
“At the mercy of the pilot and Air Canada people,” Pande said of her father. She claimed, “They were callous and inhumane.”
Meanwhile, Air Canada “categorically” rejected “any assertions that it was responsible for the customer’s death”.
The airline spokesperson, Peter Fitzpatrick, said the crew “properly followed the procedures” for dealing with onboard medical emergencies, the report said.
He, however, declined to explain the procedures when asked, it said.