Alaska Airlines Survivors of Mid-Air Blow Out Given $1,500

Alaska Airlines is offering compensation to passengers who survived a recent emergency after a portion of the aircraft they were traveling on blew out mid-flight. 

On Thursday, the company issued a statement to PEOPLE, saying, “Alaska Airlines provided a full refund to each guest on Flight 1282. As an immediate gesture of care, within the first 24 hours, we also provided a $1,500 cash payment to cover any incidental expenses to ensure their immediate needs were taken care of.” The airline also offered “24/7 access to mental health resources and counseling sessions, and noted they will “continue to work with them to address their specific needs and concerns.”

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All 177 passengers aboard Alaska Airlines Flight 1282 from Portland, Oregon to Ontario, California, survived the Jan. 5 emergency landing, which occurred after a plug door towards the rear of the aircraft blew out at 16,000 feet, leaving a gaping hole in the side.

Many passengers were understandably left extremely shaken up. Now, some who experienced the traumatic event are expressing their disapproval of the airline’s reimbursement fee.

“I haven’t fully processed if that payment is enough or not,” passenger Nicholas Hoch, 33, told the Washington Post on Wednesday regarding the $1,500. “I don’t know how this is going to affect me in the coming weeks and months, you know?”

Hoch told the outlet that in addition to the terror of the airplane’s fuselage being ripped off during the flight, he spent two hours in line, waiting for a customer service agent to issue him a ticket for a new way home.

He said he’s cautiously considering his legal options after wondering how the airline calculated $1,500 as a decent amount for the trauma.

Passenger Jessica Montoia previously spoke with the BBC, calling her flight the “trip from hell.”

Another customer named Evan Smith recalled the details of the incident to the outlet: “There was a really loud bang towards the left rear of the plane and a woosh noise,” he said, adding that “all the air masks dropped” afterward.

He also claimed there was a young passenger whose shirt was “sucked off him and out of the plane,” and the child’s mom was “holding onto him to make sure he didn’t go with it.”

This past weekend, a media brief from the National Transportation Safety Board Chair Jennifer Homendy revealed that the missing airplane part that caused the incident had been found.

The “door plug” was recovered in a teacher’s backyard in the Portland area. 

Alaska Airlines has since canceled all flights on 737-9 MAX aircraft through Jan. 13 as they conduct inspections and prepare to return to service, per the company’s website. The grounding of aircrafts has impacted approximately 110-150 flights per day.

“I am personally committed to doing everything we can to conduct this review in a timely and transparent way,” company CEO Ben Minicucci said in a statement. 

“My heart goes out to those who were on this flight – I am so sorry for what you experienced. I am so grateful for the response of our pilots and flight attendants. We have teams on the ground in Portland assisting passengers and are working to support guests who are traveling in the days ahead,” he added.