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submitted 2 years ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

A 101-year-old woman keeps getting mistaken for a baby because of an error with an airline's booking system.

The problem occurs because American Airlines' systems apparently cannot compute that Patricia, who did not want to share her surname, was born in 1922, rather than 2022.

The BBC witnessed the latest mix-up, which she and the cabin crew were able to laugh off.

“It was funny that they thought I was only a little child and I’m an old lady!” she said.

But the centenarian says she would like the glitch to be fixed as it has caused her some problems in the past.

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[-] ptz@dubvee.org 151 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

"Ma'am, are you a baby?"

Is there a discount?

"Yes, children under 5 fly free."

Then I am a baby.

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 21 points 2 years ago

They made an, in hindsight, extremely creepy movie on this subject back in the 40s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Major_and_the_Minor

(I love Billy Wilder, but ick.)

[-] RootBeerGuy@discuss.tchncs.de 19 points 2 years ago

However babys cannot fly alone so she needs an adult who pays a normal ticket to accommodate her.

[-] ptz@dubvee.org 13 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Thanks for "Ackshually"-ing an obvious joke. Please see the Yes, and... rule of thumb.

Jenna Maroney breaking the 'yes, and...' rule at improv by responding, 'no you don't, Oprah'

[-] intelisense@lemm.ee 62 points 2 years ago

I'm quite impressed she's still able to travel at 101. My mum's in her mid eighties and really struggles now.

[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 33 points 2 years ago

She's apparently not only traveled at 101, but traveled enough times since turning 100 that this has been a repeated problem for her!

Imagine being that old and still seeing the world!

[-] ABCDE@lemmy.world 5 points 2 years ago

Flying within the US to see family isn't really the world.

[-] riskable@programming.dev 17 points 2 years ago

Then stop riding in her lap!

[-] jordanlund@lemmy.world 40 points 2 years ago

We fixed this 124 years ago...

[-] stoly@lemmy.world 23 points 2 years ago

Worse is that this is basically just the Y2K problem…that they somehow never addressed.

[-] nandeEbisu@lemmy.world 23 points 2 years ago

They kludged it, probably only store 2 digits and if its lower than current year, assume 2000s, otherwise assume 1900s.

[-] stoly@lemmy.world 13 points 2 years ago

Ah, the “Windows 9” problem.

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[-] transientpunk@sh.itjust.works 8 points 2 years ago

Math is hard

[-] ArugulaZ@lemmy.zip 38 points 2 years ago

At least choose an 8-bit digit for the ages of passengers! You'd have to live to be 256 to roll that over!

[-] You999@sh.itjust.works 14 points 2 years ago

Might as well play it safe and make it a 16-bit integer on the off chance the world doesn't end and we quadruple our life expectancy

[-] model_tar_gz@lemmy.world 12 points 2 years ago

We haven’t learned our lesson about Unix time overflow yet, have we? Better up it to 64 bit signed, just to be sure.

[-] xor@lemmy.blahaj.zone 6 points 2 years ago

Make that bad boy unsigned, just to be safe!

[-] Aux@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago

BigNumber is the solution.

[-] Strawberry@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 2 years ago

Emperor Leto Atreides II deserves to Fly American™ just as much as the rest of us

[-] emptyother@programming.dev 18 points 2 years ago

I had to fight an annoying bug like this in our companys frontend code once. That specific country's pretty-date settings insisted on returning only the last two digits of a year, and the UI framework's date input field read it like that before parsing it back to a date.

[-] joyjoy@lemm.ee 16 points 2 years ago

Meanwhile in America: your baby isn't covered by Medicaid because it isn't born yet.

[-] A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world 6 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

I see you are talking about babies. Please check 1 before proceeding further

[] Birth is forced by state

[] Birth is wanted.

[-] joyjoy@lemm.ee 7 points 2 years ago

You may have received a birth certificate, but we do not recognize your status of birthed.

[-] roguetrick@lemmy.world 4 points 2 years ago

This is outrageous. This is unfair.

[-] aeronmelon@lemmy.world 14 points 2 years ago

"Ma'am, are you sure you're old enough to travel by yourself?"

"Oh hohohoho, stop!"

Just like my table-waiting days. You want to make a woman's day, just ask to see some ID when she orders alcohol because anyone who appears to be under 20 must be carded.

[-] Today@lemmy.world 2 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Honestly, that just pisses me off. It's wasting my time and the servers time. It's gone so overboard in the 'card everyone' policy.

[-] Waldowal@lemmy.world 8 points 2 years ago

Do airlines typically handle 1 year olds flying alone? That seems nuts.

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[-] FlyingSquid@lemmy.world 8 points 2 years ago

She could be a baby.

I've definitely seen uglier babies.

Especially newborns.

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this post was submitted on 28 Apr 2024
374 points (98.2% liked)

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