SIA South Africa-S'pore flight delays for almost 32 hours due to 'technical fault'

A flight back to Singapore from Cape Town, South Africa, was delayed for almost 32 hours due to a "technical fault" on the Singapore Airlines (SIA) plane.

The flight was scheduled to take off on the morning of Dec. 10 but only departed on the evening of Dec. 11.

2 consecutive delays of around 7 hours

A passenger, who wished to remain anonymous, shared with Mothership that the delay had left them stuck in the airport for close to seven hours for two consecutive days.

The 27-year-old went to Cape Town for her honeymoon and the return flight was scheduled to take off at 10:30am (4:30pm SGT) on Dec. 10.

Due to a technical fault with the plane, passengers had to wait til 5pm (11pm SGT) before they were updated that the flight was rescheduled to 7am (1pm SGT) on Dec. 11.

All passengers were provided hotel accommodation.

When the passengers arrived at the airport the next day, they were greeted with the same problem again.

The woman remarked people were beginning to run out of patience due to the lack of confirmation for a rescheduled flight and that the station manager also appeared "stressed out despite handling the situation calmly".

Passengers were provided with food vouchers for the delay.

"They only told us they will give us a text message once there's information," the passenger told Mothership. "It's frustrating because we were in the airport for a very long time."

"I was already taking unpaid leave, and this affected my meeting schedule as I didn’t bring my work laptop," the passenger said, adding that she cannot work overseas due to the nature of her work.

She also said that other passengers appeared agitated by the delays and lack of updates on the situation, with one woman saying she had to get back to Singapore as she needed to report to work after being on a long vacation.

Other passengers had attempted to book other flights out of the country, but only one was successful in getting a layover flight in Dubai, she said.

SIA sincerely apologises to all customers

When asked by Mothership, an SIA spokesperson said the airline sincerely apologises to all customers for the inconvenience caused by the delay of flight SQ479, which was scheduled to operate from Cape Town to Singapore via Johannesburg on Dec. 10.

"The Airbus A350-900 aircraft encountered a technical issue while on the ground at Cape Town International Airport," the spokesperson explained, adding that customers remained on board as the on-site engineers tried to rectify the technical issue to facilitate a quicker departure once the issue was successfully resolved.

"As the engineers on site required more time to rectify the issue, a decision was made to delay the flight," they said.

The spokesperson said customers disembarked the aircraft at 1pm (7pm SGT), and hotel accommodation and meals were arranged for them.

SQ479 was renumbered to SQ9479, and retimed to depart Cape Town at 7am (1pm SGT) on Dec. 11.

"The technical issue continued to persist on 11 December 2024, despite the best efforts of our engineers to find a solution," the spokesperson said, adding that customers were offered snacks, refreshments, and meal vouchers while waiting for the flight departure.

The spokesperson confirmed that SQ9479 departed Cape Town on Dec. 11 at 6:23pm (12:23am SGT) and arrived in Singapore at 3:03pm (SGT) on Dec. 12.

"The safety of our customers and crew is always our top priority," the spokesperson said.

Top image via Singapore Airlines