Mother says airport officials lost track of 10-year-old daughter - Atlanta News, Weather, Traffic, and Sports | FOX 5

A Marietta mom is demanding answers after an airline mix-up led her to believe her daughter was missing.

Berthyne Lauture says her 10-year-old daughter, Nyah, was scheduled to fly out of New York's LaGuardia Airport to Atlanta on AirTran on Tuesday afternoon under the supervision of an airline employee. But airline officials acknowledge that a series of delays with Nyah's flight in New York led to confusion about her whereabouts.

For several hours Tuesday night, Berthyne Lauture says airline officials couldn't tell her whether Nyah was at LaGuardia or on a flight bound for Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport.

The girl's flight was initially scheduled to leave LaGuardia at 2 p.m., but five hours later Nyah was still at the gate.

"Because of the time, the policy stated that if a child is by themselves, they cannot travel after 7:30, 7:45, something like that. They issued me another ticket to leave today at 12:19," said Lauture.

After learning Nyah's flight was rescheduled, her aunt returned to LaGuardia to pick her up.

"My sister called me and she was like, ‘She's not there." I said, ‘what do you mean she's not there,'" said Lauture.

Airline staff couldn't locate the child in their system.

"The whole drama started from there. I'm asking everybody at the airport and nobody seemed to have an answer," said Lauture.

After a lot of back and forth, Lauture says a supervisor told her there was a chance Nyah was on the 9:30 p.m. flight headed to Atlanta. The anxious mother waited at the gate, relieved when her daughter stepped off the plane around 11:30 p.m.

"That's my only child. That's my friend, my everything. For you to just tell me that for a second, you don't know where she is -- I felt like my life was over," said Lauture.
    
AirTran officials said miscommunication between staff in New York and Atlanta led to the confusion, but that Nyah was safely transferred from LaGuardia to Atlanta.  They also have offered to refund Lauture the fee the airline charges for supervising an unaccompanied minor.

Lauture says her child's flown unaccompanied without any problem, but says she'll never let her child travel under the airline's supervision again.