What: Mahan Air en route from Phuket to Tehran
Where: Kolkata airport
When: September 21, 2011
Who: 305 passengers (plus another 176 passengers from another flight)
Why: Mahan Air ran out of gas in the wrong place and the wrong time. The IOC allows the airline a certain amount of credit, when they pay a security deposit, but they were a month overdue.
The flight landed in Kolkata, the crew expecting to be able to refuel, and they were grounded. (Indian Oil Corporation.) So the airport lounge filled up with passengers from one…no, make that two Mahan Air flights when a second Mahan flight showed up. There was only room for 280, and the passengers were stuck until morning. Some sources say all 305 were stuck in the airplane, not in an overcrowded lounge for thirteen hours. Anyway, was this the experience they bought when they paid for their ticket? Apparently.