Passengers mutiny on board 'direct' flight to Morocco after pilot says it will stop twice

More than 100 plane passengers brought a new meaning to 'in-flight turbulence' last night after staging a mutiny when the captain announced some unscheduled stops.

An aircraft operated by Moroccan budget airline Jet4You had been due to make a 90-minute journey from Toulouse, France, to the Moroccan city of Casablanca.

But when the captain told the 137 passengers the plane would be stopping at Bordeaux and Lyon en route - adding four hours to the journey - the travellers refused to sit and buckle their seatbelts, leaving the plane stuck on the runway all night.

Mutiny: Passengers on a Jet4You flight from France to Morocco refused to sit and buckle their seatbelts after being told of changes to their route

And rather than reason with the paying customers, the captain simply turned off the lights and heating in the jet and left the passengers inside.

Mother of two Majette Ouri, aboard the plane, said: 'It was a total disgrace. We bought tickets for a direct flight taking less than two hours.

'But once they had us on board, they said we'd be making two unscheduled stops and taking six hours to get to Casablanca.'

'Everyone decided they could not let this happen and refused to allow the plane to take off.



'Then at that point they simply turned of the lights and heating and left us there.



'Passengers, with a lot of children and old people amongst us, were cold and hungry.



'It is frankly an appalling way to treat paying customers.'

Diversion: The Jet4You flight had been due to fly from Toulouse to Casablanca (red route) but the captain told passengers he would be travelling via Lyon and Bordeaux (green route), leading to the mutiny

According to Toulouse airport officials, 52 of the 137 passengers asked to get off the plane during the night while 85 were still on the aircraft on Sunday morning.

Jet4You said it would transport the passengers to Casablanca on a direct flight at 6pm on Sunday, and had found another means of collecting people stranded elsewhere in France.

The mutiny comes a month after more than 100 furious passengers refused to leave a Ryanair flight that was re-routed to Belgium.

The jet carrying mainly French travellers from Fez in Morocco was supposed to have landed at Beauvais airport near Paris but was delayed by weather.

But because it took off three hours late, by the time it reached Beauvais, the airport had closed.

When it landed at the southern Belgian city of Liege, the militant travellers staged a four-hour sit-in, demanding to be taken back to France.



Passengers claimed on that occasion, Ryanair cabin crew locked the toilets, turned off the lights and left them on the tarmac for four hours.

The passengers finally agreed to board coaches for the three-hour drive back to Beauvais.