Sun Country now says it will reimburse some costs for stranded Mexico fliers

Sun Country Airlines now says it plans to reimburse passengers left stranded in Mexico after the carrier cancelled its last flights of the season following a late-season blizzard in Minnesota. Instead of extending its schedule or sending charters to bring home about 250 passengers from the Mexican resort cities of Cabo San Lucas and Mazatlán, Sun Country opted instead to refund fliers’ fares and then told them they were on their own to find a new way home. Sun Country’s reversal comes after intense social media backlash and a wave of negative publicity about how it handled the situation. In a Tuesday email, Sun Country CEO Jude Bricker told airline employees that the company has decided to cover the travel costs incurred by "rightfully frustrated" customers who had to pay for a new way home after the cancellations. Sun Country has faced criticism from numerous corners about not doing more, and Bricker conceded in the e-mail that Sun County should have considered at least one "rescue flight" to bring home the marooned fliers. "With hindsight, we should have flown a rescue flight to MZT (Mazatlán) as service options are limited. SJD (Cabo San Lucas) has more service options and we felt the best option for those customers was giving them a full roundtrip refund on their Sun Country flight to make alternative arrangements as quickly as possible," Bricker said. He continued, saying Sun Country would refund fliers original round-trip fares and some additional transportation costs paid by passengers in their attempts to return home.<br/>