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a August 9th, 2014

  1. Open letter to Transavia

    August 9, 2014 by Oğuz Yarımtepe

    Dear Transavia Authorities,

    My name is Oğuz Yarımtepe and with my wife we were one of the passengers of the flight HV6583 that is from Amsterdam to Istanbul Sabiha Gökçen airport. Unfortunatelly we had a bad travel and i want some answers about our trip, thats why i am writing this letter to you.

    Our flight took off on time from Amstertdam on 8th of August. When we reached to the Istanbul, the plane started to land, we were expecting to be on the land in a few minutes but it was a sudden movement that the pilot moved the plane up in a sudden decision, after tilting the plane first left and then right. There were some screams during this action. People were afraid. When we were at a certain altitude, the pilot explained that the air conditions were not good enough at Sabiha Gökçen Airport and he would be landing to another airport suitable. We were expecting somewhere in Turkey, Atatürk Airport or Çorlu, or even Izmir or Ankara. We landed at Bulgaria, Burgas Airport. It was that time our problems started.

    Since it was an unplanned landing, we first waited on plane till we enter to the airport. After we entered to the airport, we learned that we are not able to move the airport because of some documentary issues. We never learned why we landed Burgas Airport. We got some food after the decision of sending us to Istanbul via buses. I don’t know the time but the food delivery occured when the people asked about it.  People tried to call their families, as soon as we landed but luckly, Bulgaria was out of coveredge of some telecommunication networks, like the one i used, Vodafone. There was no free Internet on the airport, we had to ask each others about using the phone. I would like to learn the reason of chosing the Burgas Airport for landing. It was clear that they were not expecting us, except from information desk, none were able to speak English, well.

    We are transfered to the busses around 17.00pm. Our driver was unable to speak neither Dutch nor English, so we were not sure about how long it will take from Burgas to Istanbul. Some says 3 hours, driver said 6 hours with its fingers. The bus was not a comfortable one. No air conditioning, no suspension. Why did you send us to Istanbul via buses? I know that some of us asked for buying their own flight tickets to Istanbul, but it is not allowed. Some asked about renting car, that is also not allowed. Do you know the time we reached at Sabiha Gökçen Airport? Did you check whether we arrived safely?

    It was around 4.00 in the morning when we left the bus at Sabiha Gökçen Airport. Did you think about, how we will reach our homes or destinations from Sabiha at 4 in the mornig in Istanbul? Some people missed their next flights, some like me had to get on a bus to go to their homes, some changed their car travel plans and tried to find a place to sleep, either a hotel or asked help from their relatives. It was around 8 when i was at Bursa.  I had got up 5.00 in the mornig, so you made us travel 24 hours. I think you owe us “our lost time”. I lost my time on buses. We could be somewhere in Turkey in 30 minutes via plane and could reach our destinations earlier. How will you cover our losses? I returned holiday and had to sleep till evening on Saturday.

    Everyone on the bus with me said that they will not use Transavia anymore. I am sure the rest of the people are thinking in the same way. So you lost around 100 customers * their relatives, friends * the people they reached online.

    I don’t want to blame anyone, but i think we deserve some explanations. I will be happy if you reply this mail. I will be sharing this letter with the ones that are on the same bus with me.

    Regards.

    Oğuz Yarımtepe

    oguzyarimtepe at gmail.com

    http://about.me/oguzy