'I don’t trust Sunwing': Some Sask. residents driving home amid flight cancellations

After a tumultuous week for Sunwing airline, including seemingly endless delays from Punta Cana and other tropical destinations, passengers say they've lost faith in the airline.

A Winnipeg flight with people who were in Punta Cana was expected to land at the Saskatoon airport late Wednesday evening.

However, some passengers chose to take matters into their own hands, deciding to rent a car and drive from Winnipeg to Saskatoon instead.

“When they said we had a flight today at 10:30 and I was like ‘I don’t trust Sunwing anymore, I can’t fly with Sunwing … and so we booked a rental vehicle last night at 2 a.m. and now we’re currently past Brandon, Manitoba,” Amanda Goddard told CTV News via Zoom while sitting in the passenger seat.

Goddard says while it’s great to be back in Canada, she and her three other friends are tired and wanted to get home as soon as possible.

“We’ve had dogs that are in daycare for way too long now, we have jobs to get back to, as far as we were concerned there was no plane,” Goddard said.

While renting a car and driving home may seem like the light at the end of the tunnel, not everyone is as lucky. Corrine Fiddler is stranded in Winnipeg with her family, a group of 10 people.

“Renting a car is not an option for us, not with all of us. Travelling with a baby, all of our luggage, it’s just not possible,” Fiddler.

Sunwing has also announced it is cancelling operations from both Saskatoon and Regina airports. The cancellations will go until February 3, 2023. In the meantime, the company said it’s doing “everything possible” to repatriate customers currently in destination.