“American Airlines Always Does This” — Passport-Less Fliers Stuck in Bahamas Terminal Limbo

A group of American Airlines passengers found themselves stuck in a Bahamas terminal for several hours with limited access to food and water and only a single bathroom to share among an entire plane's worth of fliers.

In a viral TikTok uploaded by a user named Kate (@italiankate), one passenger shared the way the airline handled the situation. Many other users on the app felt like the passengers were needlessly subjected to inhumane conditions.

Kate begins her video focusing on an air commuter who shares their travel grievances from flying out of Puerto Rico to the United States. Unfortunately, due to inclement weather, the pilot thought that it would be better to be safe than sorry. So instead of trying to make it to the U.S. from PR, they landed in the Bahamas instead.

Now here's where things get tricky — since PR is a United States territory, you don't need a passport to travel there. However, the Commonwealth of the Bahamas is very much its own country. This means that if you're arriving or departing the nation to or from the U.S., you'll need a passport.

Because Kate and her travel partner were only supposed to be traveling from the U.S. to Puerto Rico and back, they didn't think they would need to keep their passports on them. After landing in the Bahamas, the pilot goes on to ask which passengers have their passports and which do not.

The man narrating the story says that because they were all on a domestic flight, nobody on the flight responded in the affirmative. To make matters even worse, they couldn't depart from the Bahamas airport even though they were cleared for takeoff. That's because the pilot "couldn't do overtime."

Which means that all of the passengers were stuck in the terminal until a pilot was selected for their flight. They couldn't leave the area because they were technically in the Bahamas illegally.

The weary looks on everyone's faces in the video begin to make a lot more sense when the man explains just how long they've been waiting in the airport.

He says that they landed in the Bahamas at approximately 8 p.m. on Saturday night. He then checks his watch and states that as he's recording the video, it was already 5:40 a.m. of the following morning.

His frustration evidently mounts as he begins to talk about the way American Airlines made passengers think that they were going to just have a minor delay and be on their merry way. He says that within the first hour of them landing in the Bahamas, they were told that a plane was getting ready for them so they could make it back home.

He says that American hasn't provided any updates on their situation and that the passengers, for several hours, have been subsisting on Biscoff cookies and sodas.

According to the flier, another passenger suffering from a "medical emergency" was barred from going back onto the plane so they could access their medication due to "laws" and "red tape."

"We're on hour seven of being here. No food. No water. It's cold. No blanket. We have one bathroom for 100 people. Dogs. Children. No information," he says, gesturing towards the number of passengers who are stuck in the terminal.

The passenger continued, "Hopefully we get a refund after this. I'd ask around to see how everyone else is feeling. I wouldn't be surprised if my feeling was mutual."

There weren't any further updates on the situation posted to Kate's TikTok account.

A number of users on the application sympathized with the plight of the American Airline passengers. One user on the app was shocked at the fliers' treatment: "Dude, y’all’s was kidnapped!" they penned.

Another person didn't seem all that surprised by the predicament the travelers found themselves in. They wrote: "American Airlines always does this."

Someone else believed this was grounds for legal action. And seeing as there were so many passengers, they may have a class action lawsuit on their hands: "Speak to an attorney ASAP."

If you were wondering what happened to the folks in the video, the comments section looked like it had an answer. One TikToker, @dimas, said that they were on the AA flight that landed in the Bahamas. They wrote that they ended up leaving the country around five hours after that video was recorded.

"We didn’t end up leaving the Bahamas until 10:15 a.m.. We were locked in there for 14 HOURS," they said.

Several people responded that they thought they had a strong case to receive monetary compensation for the way that American handled their flight.

One user on the app recommended that they don't waste their time by going to American Airlines to try and get paid. Rather, they should contact the Federal Aviation Administration: "You can file a complaint with the FAA. American isn’t going to give you your money back, but the FAA might make them. They also might make them come get you guys."