SEVENTEEN Criticized For Delaying Entire Flight Due To Their Tardiness

Pledis apologized.

A boy group that was revealed to be SEVENTEEN has been criticized for being late to an Asiana Airlines flight, causing the entire flight to be delayed while they were waiting for their arrival. Pledis Entertainment has responded to the incident, and have apologized and shared their explanation.

On June 18, a netizen posted their experience with the delay, revealing the airline asked the passengers onboard to wait because of a boy group.

Yesterday, I was flying into Korea from Okinawa on the same flight as a boy group, but because of that group, the flight was delayed for about an hour. A representative from Asiana let us know that they were following procedure and that there were some passengers who did not board the plane yet, and asked us to wait. The group arrived late and went to their business class seats. Some of their staff sat in economy class.

The same netizen continued, criticizing the group for forcing everyone else on the plane to wait for them.

From what I know, the other passengers complained too. They were asking who they could be to be causing us damage. If they waited for everyone like this, I wouldn’t be complaining. It’s ridiculous if you’re giving such special treatment to celebrities. Get a chartered plane if you want to fly on your own schedules.

The boy group was revealed to be SEVENTEEN, who held their fan event SEVENTEEN & CARAT in OKINAWA from June 14-16. On June 17, they returned back to Korea.

A separate netizen posted on their blog about their experience with the delayed flight, mentioning SEVENTEEN by name.

Flight OZ171, which was delayed, was really annoying. They announced on the plane intercom that we would be delayed because we were waiting for some passengers, those passengers were SEVENTEEN. The flight departed as soon as SEVENTEEN and some of their fans boarded the plane, which is ridiculous.

Even the express bus doesn’t wait and just leaves right away, but the plane is so lax. What was supposed to be a pleasant trip to Okinawa ended in disappointment.

— Netizen

Flight OZ171 was scheduled to land at Incheon International Airport at 3:25 pm, but due to a delay, arrived 1 hour and 9 minutes late at 4:34 pm.

Pledis Entertainment has responded to the incident, stating that the members were delayed due to document problems.

The SEVENTEEN members were suddenly caught up at the airport check-in due to document problems, causing them to be delayed for about 30 minutes. In addition, the flight was originally scheduled to be delayed by 30 minutes due to bad weather.

SEVENTEEN and their staff finished checking in at the airport on time, but suddenly a staff at the Okinawa airport grabbed a hold of them and informed them that they needed to fill out more documents, causing the 30 minute delay.

Passengers who are scheduled to enter Korea from Japan are randomly selected to provide a statement. SEVENTEEN has a Japanese visa and usually they don’t have to do any paperwork. They also checked in normally because they were initially told that they did not have to do any paperwork when returning to Korea.

It was not intentional, but we would like to apologize for the delay in departure time for the flight.

— Pledis Entertainment

Source: Star News and SBS FunE

SEVENTEEN