TALLAHASSEE, FL (WTXL) - Four flights were diverted to Tallahassee Tuesday night due to bad weather in Atlanta.
The flights were traveling to Atlanta from Mexico, according to Chris Curry, the Director of Aviation at the Tallahassee Regional Airport, and had to stop in Tallahassee because of thunderstorms near Atlanta.
Curry says two of the flights were able to land and refuel before departing and continuing their flight to Atlanta.
The other two flights though had to wait for new crew members. Curry explains that flight crews have a limit of how much time they can spend in the air and the two crews had reached their limit.
300 passengers were asked to de-plane in Tallahassee while Delta found replacement crews, according to Curry. 298 of those passengers had a 5 hour delay in the airport.
The remaining 2 passengers asked to terminate their flight in Tallahassee. Curry says because this was an international flight, Delta had to bring customs and border protection from Panama City to release those passengers.
Several passengers took to Twitter to express their frustrations over the delay, mentioning the fact that the Tallahassee Regional Airport does not have customs.
Twitter user @Ccarnew said, "Can't believe this @Delta SUCH a good idea to send the plane to Tallahassee which doesn't have customs.. Horrible service #ruinedplans".
That doesn't mean though that the airport doesn't dream of accommodating international passengers in the future.
The City of Tallahassee announced in October of 2014 the plans to change the airport from "regional" to "international".
However, in a January Commission Meeting the name change was addressed with the understanding that it would still take a considerable amount of time before international flights could be processed at the airport.
