San Francisco

American Airlines Sends Dog to the Wrong City from SFO

A woman is still looking for answers after her 13-pound poodle was lost while she flew American Airlines from the San Francisco International Airport to Raleigh, North Carolina earlier this week.

Amber Dalton said that though the pup is alive and well, it took the airline a while to figure out where they sent her.

"I was pulled out of line at boarding and told that the flight that was going through Chicago, was not safe for pets," she said.

Dalton had checked her poodle Beast into the cargo hold because he was too big to fly with her at her seat. So instead of flying through Chicago, they would have to fly through Dallas.

However, Beast and the rest of her luggage went through Chicago anyway and the pup didn’t get to Raleigh that night.

It took gate agents a few hours to track him down.

"They actually did not know where he went," Dalton said. "Then at about 10:30 they let me know that he had been put on a flight to Philadelphia."

American Airlines has since apologized for the mishap, issuing a statement that read, "A conflict in our customers routing and policies caused us to keep their pet overnight in Philadelphia at a local pet hotel."

Dalton had to leave Raleigh and head to Roanoke, Virginia so American Airlines flew the dog to Raleigh then drove him to Roanoke where they were finally reunited a day and a half after they left San Francisco.

Dalton said she appreciates the airline gave her a free flight voucher and waived her luggage fees.

"Thank you, but how did you do this?" she said. "And what are you going to do to make sure this doesn’t happen to another dog?"

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