WOW! Alaska Airlines employee buys plane ticket for stranded passenger out-of-pocket

SEATAC, Wash. -- An Alaska Airlines employee went to great lengths to make sure a traveler arrived home -- by paying for her ticket out of her own pocket.

Vancouver B.C.'s News1130 reports that Miriam Thomas was trying to return home from a business trip last week, when her ticket was cancelled by Delta Airlines due to unscheduled delays and other issues. She was told she wouldn't be able to fly from Seattle to Vancouver until the next day.

The passenger says she checked in with Alaska Airlines to see if there was any flight Thomas could take that day to get home. That's when an Alaska employee paid for her ticket to get on the next flight to Vancouver.

Thomas told the station, "She’s filling (a form) out and I thought she just had these free passes. At one point her coworkers were standing behind her saying ‘Judy! Judy! You don’t have to do that.’ And she says ‘You know what, I’m paying it forward, it’s OK.’ At this point I realize something is up and she pulls out her credit card and starts putting in her credit card information.”

“She paid for my ticket, she paid for me to get home. She didn’t know me at all. I was sitting up at the gate waiting for the flight and she came by asking me how I was and offered me money for coffee. I was boarding and I thanked her again and she hugged me. It was amazing. She didn’t need to do that at all, she took care of me.”

Thomas was returning from a business trip to southern California. She says the outbound Delta flight also had issues, and she was forced to stay in a hotel an extra night while those issues were sorted out.