Residents of Gander, Nfld., formed an impromptu volunteer shuttle service for about 200 passengers aboard two planes forced to land unexpectedly at the town’s airport on Wednesday night.
Jackie Freake, assistant manager at the Quality Hotel, says she got a call Wednesday night asking if there were rooms for any of the passengers aboard the planes that had taken off from Toronto and Montreal.
Feake says there were only a few cabs on the road in the central Newfoundland town, so she posted in a local Facebook group saying there were more than 100 people at the airport needing to get to their hotels.
People immediately hopped in their cars to offer rides, and Freake says the passengers were snug in their hotel rooms within an hour of her post.
She says volunteer drivers were lined up outside the hotel this morning to take people back to the airport to continue their journeys to St. John’s.
The people of Gander made international news when they sheltered and fed thousands of airline passengers stranded in the town for days after the attacks in the United States on Sept. 11, 2001.
If you enjoyed or found this story useful, we’d appreciate if you would forward it to a colleague or friend who may also enjoy it. If, on the other hand, a friend shared it with you, welcome! You can get all the latest travel news and reviews from Travel Industry by simply clicking HERE.