Lathigra v. British Airways Plc

41 F.3d 535 Jayantilal LATHIGRA; Sandhya Lathigra; Lillam Jayantilal; Reekha Nimchand; Shashi Shah, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. BRITISH AIRWAYS PLC, a U.S. holding of British Airways, P.L.C., a Michigan corporation, Defendant-Appellee. No. 93-35072. United States Court of Appeals, Ninth Circuit. Argued and Submitted June 8, 1994. Decided Dec. 1, 1994. Howard Alan Coleman, Riddell, Williams, Bullitt & Walkinshaw, Bellevue, WA, for plaintiffs-appellants. Diane Westwood Wilson, Condon & Forsyth, New York City, for defendant-appellee. Appeal from the United States District Court for the Western District of Washington. Before: POOLE, BRUNETTI, and KLEINFELD, Circuit Judges. BRUNETTI, Circuit Judge: 1 Appellants were British Airways passengers returning from Seattle to Madagascar, with a connecting flight on Air Mauritius from Nairobi to Antananarivo. Days before the flight in September 1989, their agent (i.e., the relative whom they had been visiting in Seattle) called British Airways ("BA") to reconfirm the booking. BA, which had itself issued the tickets, reconfirmed appellants' reservations, but neglected to inform them that the Air Mauritius flight had been discontinued. 1…