Passenger With Nut Allergy Accuses Airline of Forcing Her to Sign Waiver

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*Originally posted on travelradar.aero - the leading aviation news source*

A passenger with a severe nut allergy has accused Bamboo Airways of forcing her to sign a waiver form before flying to Vietnam.

Further Details

Passenger Abbie Tomlinson stated that the incident took place on the 9th October whilst she was on board a Bamboo Airways flight from London Heathrow to Vietnam with her friend. Before boarding her flight, she emailed Bamboo Airways to alert them of her nut allergy, which was successfully delivered. However, Tomlinson did not hear back from the airline before the flight. Therefore, she and her friend made it a priority to let the cabin crew members know of her allergy as soon as they had boarded the flight to ensure that nuts were not served on the plane.

Due to being a Vietnamese airline, the passenger claims that she was at first unsure as to whether the message was completely understood due to an inevitable language barrier. According to Tomlinson, a cabin crew member that she informed began ‘laughing in her face’ when she kindly requested that nuts were not served during the flight. She was also told that she could leave the aircraft if she did not believe that it was safe for her to travel in. After disagreeing to this, she was then asked to sign a waiver form to indicate that she was the one who had agreed to travel on the flight, at her own risk. Abbie Tomlinson took to Twitter to share the ordeal.

Unfortunately, irrespective of Abbie Tomlinson and her friend making the danger of her allergy clear to cabin crew members, she has said that less than fifteen minutes into the flight staff members served passengers complimentary peanuts resulting in her being left in tears.

Bamboo Airways’ response

The Vietnamese airline has since both apologised for how the situation was dealt with yet has disputed the claim that they had forced Abbie Tomlinson to sign a waiver form. According to the airline’s spokesperson, the passenger was initially asked to reschedule her flight, yet she insisted that she wanted to make this particular flight resulting in the airline giving her a waiver form to sign.

Is this a common treatment for nut allergy sufferers on flights?

Unfortunately, this is not the first time that a nut allergy sufferer has complained about the treatment that they have received from an airline due to their allergies. In early December 2021, passenger Sophie Draper shared that she was kicked off a flight by American Airlines after making it known to the airline’s staff that she had a nut allergy. Sadly, In 2016, an incident that was fatal also took place on a British Airways flight as 15-year-old Natasha Ednan-Laperouse died on the flight shortly after eating a baguette from Pret- A- Manger. Since her death, her parents have been actively campaigning for nut allergy sufferers to receive more attentive treatment whilst on flights.

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*https://travelradar.aero*