Saturday’s Saudia flight SV832 from Jeddah to Kuala Lumpur turned back to the gate because a woman on board forgot her baby at the gate and insisted the plane return.
Since communications between a commercial airliner and the ground are available, it’s worth a listen to this exchange. The pilot asks, “May God be with us. Can we come back or what?”
“This flight is requesting to come back…a passenger forgot her baby in the waiting area, the poor thing,” one party stated. After being asked again to explain the ordeal, the pilot replied, “We told you, a passenger left her baby in the terminal and refuses to continue the flight.”
“Ok, head back to the gate,” the operator said, according to Gulf News, before admitting, “This is totally a new one for us.”
I’m genuinely not sure how something like this happens, although I’ll admit to days as a new dad where I was very tired. The Boeing 787-9 was delayed 54 minutes.
(HT: Donald W.)
I see a “Home Alone 4” script in the making.
The mother could be wealthy and has nurses and staff to care for her baby so she is not used to always being only an arms length from her child.
Could be it was an arranged marriage and she doesn’t like her husband and is not attached to the child of that relationship and does not pay attention to the child having others care for the baby.
This is completely not normal, a mother cannot forget her child at the gate without some mitigating underlying emotional detachment in existence.
I will admit that as a new Dad I was extra stressed the first time I alone took my baby on a car outing. I really appreciated what my wife normally did.
I also must say that there is a maximum number of children a mother can safely care for and cope with. For some Women that number might be one or less.
When younger, I never could fathom how a parent could do something like leave a baby in a hot car by mistake.
Then we had our son and I became a stay-at-home dad. At that point, I understood. It has to be experienced or you will never get it.
For months with no more than 90 minutes of sleep at a time I was the tiredest I have ever been, delirious almost, and often was not thinking clearly at all.
I can’t believe there is a parent reading this that can’t relate to this ultimate OMG moment. I have never actually DONE that, but I have had nightmares like it. Remember that scene in “Raising Arizona” where somebody drives off with Baby MacGuffin in a car seat on top of the car? I never did that either, but it’s the kind of thing I worried about when I had an infant and a toddler. I did once leave a folder of important work papers on top of my car, so… you know, why not a baby?
Spoiler – the baby was fine.
Interesting….once when we were jet-lagged we put the baby seat on top of the car…with our baby in it, packed things into the car, got in, turned the key and noticed at that moment that the baby was not in the car. Each of us thought the other had strapped in the baby seat. We got out, put seat and baby in their correct place, and started driving. Crazy things like that can happen, especially when youre jetlagged.