KEY POINTS:
Passengers waiting to take off on an Air New Zealand flight were stunned after the pilots announced over the intercom they would be delayed - because they had to take a meal break.
Passengers on flight NZ553 from Auckland to Christchurch late last week were told their flight would be held up because the pilot and co-pilot had not had their dinner and they would try to order takeaways to speed things up.
The crew said they were legally entitled to a meal and their in-flight dinner had gone missing.
The flight was due to leave at 7.30pm but did not take off until around 8pm and arrived at 9.05pm instead of the scheduled time of 8.40pm, passengers said.
One passenger told the Herald most people aboard joked about it rather than being annoyed.
"They were laughing. Someone said, 'This just adds to my Mickey Mouse day'. People were kind of stoic. It became a standing joke with passengers. They were saying, 'Everyone needs to go and have a meal break now'.
"The pilot said, 'By law we need a break. I'll try and keep it short by getting takeaways'. And we actually saw him get off the plane and walk back into the terminal."
He said the pilot told them it would be easier for the passengers to sit in the plane and wait, because it would take 45 minutes to load them off and on again.
"I've never heard of a pilot holding everyone up to have a break," the passenger added.
Another passenger said she would prefer to be flown by a nourished pilot.
"They have a pretty important job. I wouldn't want the pilot flaking out.
"They said their meals, which were due to be loaded, had gone elsewhere so they had to get food.
"They got takeaways, as they called them, and brought them on the flight deck to eat.
"The passengers weren't disgruntled. There were jokes going around."
Air NZ spokeswoman Andrea Dale said the pilots were already running 13 minutes late from another flight due to service delays and under Civil Aviation Authority rules they were required to take a break.
"It's a safety thing."
The flight arrived 29 minutes late, she said.
Another spokesman said that depending on how full the aircraft was, there could have been up to 130 passengers aboard.
