Jon Pielaet describes himself as “cynical” about air travel.
“I feel like every other time I fly my equipment is damaged,” he said. “I feel like there is a lot of under-reporting going on and the statistics don’t reflect the reality.”
Pielaet has cerebral palsy and relies on a manual wheelchair to get around. He traveled from his home in Portland, Oregon, to visit his mother in Missoula, Montana, on June 2 and connected in Salt Lake City. When he arrived in Utah, he could tell something was wrong with his wheelchair.
“I felt like something was off but I had to focus on making my connection,” he said. “The damage wasn’t immediately noticeable because I didn’t have time to fully inspect the chair in the terminal. It’s not something I can do in the chair.”
It turns out the frame of his wheelchair had been bent in transit.
“The front wheels weren’t making contact with the ground, it needed my body weight to make contact with the ground,” Pielaet said. In addition, the pushrims were scratched and some wheel spokes were broken.
Because Pielaet has difficulty accessing the bathroom on airplanes, he said he usually dehydrates himself before a trip, which means he’s rarely in the clearest frame of mind when he flies.
“I didn’t fully understand the damage until a few days later when I had rested and recovered from my trip,” he said. “It’s very difficult to fully document at the time when it happens.”
Although he said he explained the…
