Oh, now this is just horrific: when 57-year-old Teresa Olaya died, her husband Miguel arranged for the body to be shipped to her hometown of Guayaquil, Ecuador. Unfortunately for Migel, American Airlines lost the body for 4 days. When American finally found Teresa’s remains, she was “so badly decomposed… [that he] had to forgo a traditional open-casket funeral”.
It’s unclear what, exactly, happened here. Migel and his daughter Laura flew to Guayaquil ahead of the body to make arrangements. When the body didn’t show up, he was given contradictory information from American personnel, who told him at times that the body was in Miami, other times that she was in Guatemala City. What’s absolutely clear is that the body was not refrigerated. At all. “When I opened the casket, it was a terrible shock,” said Olaya. “I still can’t get it out of my mind”. It’s unclear whether Teresa’s body had been embalmed (it was picked up from a mortuary in Brooklyn, but the original article doesn’t say if embalming took place there or not). I also don’t know if embalmed bodies need refrigerating.
Dear God, people! What the hell happened here? This isn’t your average Samsonite bag we’re talking about here… it’s a giant fucking cardboard box with “HUMAN REMAINS” stamped in big letters on the side! American isn’t talking – Migel is suing for millions, and American won’t comment on “pending litigation”. So we have no idea if the body was shuffled from airport to airport, held up in customs, or misplaced in an unheated warehouse for those four days.
This is, quite frankly, one of the most pitiful stories I’ve ever heard. It seems that American Airlines can even screw you over in death!