There's Been Another Dog Travel Mix-Up, This Time On American
There's been yet another pet travel incident on an airplane — this time on an American Airlines flight.
A Texas family was waiting on a new puppy for their 8-year-old son to arrive on an American Airlines flight Monday morning. The puppy, a mini Bernadoodle named Atlantic Ocean, was flying in the cargo hold from its breeder in Kansas City (MCI) to his new home in San Antonio (SAT).
But, when the American flight arrived, the boy's mother realized American had sent them the wrong dog. The dog she was given at the airline's cargo pickup was a dog that was supposed to be sent to a family in Portland, Oregon.
Meanwhile, Atlantic Ocean was sent on Monday from Kansas City (MCI) to Dallas (DFW) to Portland (PDX). Then the puppy was sent to Los Angeles (LAX), where he would spend the night with food and water before finally being sent to his family in San Antonio (SAT) on Tuesday afternoon.
"You should know where the dog is!" the Texas woman, Carrie LaCasse, said. "It's like a baby, it can't talk you need to do extra stuff to make sure pets don't get lost."
American Airlines told San Antonio's KOMO News that it was investigating the incident, but for now the carrier believes it shipped the dogs according to the information it had been given, and perhaps there was a mixup with the Kansas City breeder.
"We are still finalizing our investigation, but currently all of the paperwork shows that we shipped the dogs as we received them," American Spokeswoman Kristin Courtney wrote to KOMO News. "The dog is currently at staying in a climate-controlled room in Portland waiting for his flight to Los Angeles. He will stay the night in Los Angeles at The Kennel Club (right outside the airport entrance). They are a valued partner and care for many of our animals when they need to overnight. The dogs are fed and watered and are able to run around. They will even bath[e] them if necessary."
This mixup comes amid a deluge of pet flying incidents in recent weeks — most notably, a French bulldog that died when placed in an overhead been of a United flight in March. The airline said it would issue brightly colored luggage tags for all onboard pet carriers to avoid a similar incident in the future. United also sent a Kansas family's dog to Japan by mistake in March and chartered a private jet to fly the dog back to Kansas before temporarily pausing its pet travel service in its cargo holds in an effort to better improve the program.
