Jena Butts had just spent three months in Puerto Plata, where she found and fell in love with a stray dog. He decided to bring the animal back to Canada and find him a good home.
Butch, along with a rescue named Winston and her own dog, arrived at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport around 1:30 a.m. Saturday morning. At about 2 a.m. her dog went outside — but Winston didn’t.
“(I) spoke to some of the people who had luggage as they were there and said ‘I’m still waiting for a dog’. They told me there’s nothing else there,” she said.
At around 3am a customs official advised her to go home and call the airline later as there were no other staff around.
“I was very angry and didn’t understand how no one could be at the airport to help me find my dog,” she said. “This is a living creature.”
Butch spent the rest of the morning trying to contact the airline, Air Transat, to find out if Winston had arrived in Toronto or was still in Puerto Plata.
About 21 hours later, customs at Pearson Airport located the crate.
“She was found in a corner of lost bags,” Butch said.
A customs officer had broken Winston out of his cage to give him water, Butch said, but the animal was still covered in urine by the time he reached him.
“He’s very traumatized,” she said. “Definitely won’t be traveling with dogs for a while now.”
Butch said she received an email from GTA dnata, the service provider for Air Transit at Pearson Airport, apologizing for the incident and offering her a gift card as compensation.
“While there were reasons for the service failure that left you wondering about the whereabouts of your precious pet, we can only assure you that we will take the necessary steps to ensure that no other pet owner faces a similar situation.” , CEO wrote Antonio Alvarez. “You trusted them with your precious cargo and unfortunately we let you down.”
“As a dog owner, I can fully appreciate the distress our failure has caused you and we would like to offer you a small sample of compensation in the form of a gift card that you can use at your discretion.”
Butts said she has yet to hear directly from Air Transat. When reached for comment, the airline told CTV News Toronto that they have requested a full investigation into the incident.
“We are deeply sorry that our client had to go through this stressful situation. We will contact them directly to provide full details and offer compensation. “
Butch said she’s not interested in compensation all together. What the airline wants to do is create a better policy regarding the handling of live animals on their planes.
“I’m still very upset,” she said. “It’s hard to put my words together. There has to be a process, better policies.”
“I feel like (Air Transat) could have handled the situation a lot better and, you know, with a little more empathy because nobody seemed to care.”
She said Winston was supposed to be moved to his new home the day he landed, but that was pushed back a day because of the traumatic experience.
In recent weeks, travelers flying through Pearson Airport have complained about lost luggage and delayed or canceled flights. Photos show thousands of bags sitting idle in the baggage claim area, waiting for their owners to come and collect them.
One man told CP24 he arrived in Toronto 16 days ago and was still waiting for his lost luggage.
The Greater Toronto Airport Authority cited staff shortages, flight delays and cancellations and temporary mechanical outages as some of the reasons for the “baggage challenges.”
With files from CTV News Toronto’s Jessica Smith and Carol Charles
