6-year-old put on wrong flight while traveling to grandma for Christmas holiday

Spirit Airlines said the boy was under the care and supervision of an airlines employee the entire time, even though he was incorrectly boarded.

Associated Press

Dec 26, 2023

FORT MYERS, Fla. (AP) — A 6-year-old boy who left on a flight for the Christmas holiday to visit his grandmother in southwest Florida instead was put on the wrong plane and ended up 160 miles away in Orlando, Florida.

When the grandmother, Maria Ramos, showed up on Thursday at Southwest Florida International Airport in Fort Myers to greet her grandson who was flying for the first time from Philadelphia, she was told he wasn’t on the Spirit Airlines flight.

“I ran inside the plane to the flight attendant and I asked her, ‘Where’s my grandson? He was handed over to you at Philadelphia?’ She said, ‘No, I had no kids with me,’” Ramos told WINK News.

A Spirit Airlines plane — A Spirit airlines plane is pushed back from the gate at Miami International Airport on July 27, 2022 in Miami, Florida. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

She then got a call from her grandson from the airport in Orlando, telling her that he had landed.

In a statement, Spirit Airlines said the boy was under the care and supervision of an airlines employee the entire time, even though he was incorrectly boarded on a flight to Orlando. Once the mistake was discovered, the airlines let the family know, the statement said.

“We take the safety and responsibility of transporting all of our Guests seriously and are conducting an internal investigation,” the statement said. “We apologize to the family for this experience.”