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Passenger says airline's apology stinks
10:36 AM PDT on Friday, June 22, 2007
SEATTLE - Continental Airlines has issued an apology to passengers who endured a two-day trans-Atlantic flight with sewage overflowing from a jet's lavatories.
But a Seattle resident who was on the flight from Amsterdam to New Jersey isn't buying it.
Collin Brock remains disgusted that he had to sit near excrement in the aisles. He says there are blatant descrepancies in the statement Continental released to the public about the incident this week.
"It is my firm belief that if a Continental rep had been at the gate when we deboarded in Newark and had offered us something that was relatively a decent amount of compensation that this problem probably wouldn't have been exposed the way it has," Brock said.
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Flight 71, with 168 customers on board, took off June 13 from Amsterdam bound for Newark, N.J., but only got as far as Shannon, Ireland because of a problem with the lavatory.
Brock took photographs of sewage spilling down the aisle of the passenger cabin.
"I was forced to sit next to human excrement," he said earlier this week.
The plane spent the night in Ireland and departed again the next day. Repairs were made in Ireland, according to Continental.
A Continental spokesman said Thursday that during the flight from Shannon to New Jersey, the problem developed again, but Brock says that's incorrect.
"One thing that I would really like to stress is they say during the flight from Shannon to Newark the problem developed again," Brock said. "When we boarded the plane again, before we took off from Shannon, we were informed that the toilets were in the same type of condition. I don’t see how it's possible for them to claim that the problem developed again."
He doesn't think the toilets were ever really fixed.
It was later determined the blockage was caused by someone flushing latex gloves down the toilet, said Continental spokesman Dave Messing.
Brock says that's another point of contention.
"I don't understand how one latex glove and a couple of latex gloves down one toilet or two toilets affects the entire plane," he said.
He says there was only one, half-working restroom for roughly 170 people to use.
Brock also said he's been in contact with many other passengers who were on that flight - all of them furious that Continental is not just 'fessing up about the problems.
Continental spokesman Messing said in a statement: "We deeply regret the serious inconvenience to our customers and are apologizing to them and compensating them for the poor conditions on the flight as well as the diversion and delay."
He said Continental is compensating passengers with travel vouchers.
Earlier this week, Brock said: "I've never felt so offended in all my life. I felt like I had been physically abused and neglected. I was forced to sit next to human excrement for seven hours."
He said that the flight attendants -- even though they were serving meal service in a stinky, unappetizing cabin -- told everyone to not eat or drink too much.
Brock said: "But to be told that we were supposed to monitor what comes out the other end of us was insulting."
"Shame on Continental. It was the worst flight experience I have ever had."
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