I find it hard to believe, I'm just thinking how many steps you have to go through before even getting on the plane. I've never flown from Manchester but I would think most airports are the same. First you show your boarding card when you go through security, then you go through passport control, then at the departure gate you show boarding card and often passport once more. On the plane many airlines want to see the boarding card as you enter the plane before you even get to your seat. To top it all the cabin staff failed to include him in the headcount that they make before taking off.
It just doesn't ring true to me, everytime I have flown over the last few months security has been very strict, documents are required to be shown on numerous occasions. If this really happened it's not only the airline staff that are at fault but the passport contol and security staff.

Its certainly the headcount that I can't understand at all. Do jet2 not issue seat numbers or do you just sit anywhere? Someone is for the high jump.

I've never flown with Jet2 Fiona but I believe they are one of the lowcost airlines that do allocate seats at check in. In which case the whole affair gets stranger. Maybe someone will correct me about seat allocation if I am incorrect.

I certainly had a seat number allocated when I flew with Jet2. Once you have gone through security at Manchester, having shown your boarding card, there are no passport checks until you reach the boarding gate. We have always had to show our passports as well as boarding cards at this point and then our boarding cards again when getting onto the actual plane.

Can't understand why Security, gate staff and cabin crew didn't count boarding cards and 'heads'.

I imagine that things will be tightened up now with more stringent checks on groups, whether they be families with children or not.

I wonder how the phone call went? We have found your son. He flew to Rome!

There was an article I read the other week whereby a surfer, boarded the wrong Ryanair flight and ended up in Sweden instead of France. Ryanair said that during the head count a child was hiding

To a certain extent, I can quite understand how it can happen.
My hubby boarded a Monarch flight in June 2010 via Manchester without going through the Rapiscan body scanners, without walking through the 'arch' or being manually checked with a 'wand', and yet they have all the latest technology.

Many years ago my youngest had a bad habit of walking way in front of us, we were 'pulled' at Manchester after arriving from Tenerife and the Customs Officer thought we were just a couple and he wanted to investigate our cases.

There were passsengers all 'bunched' together trying to exit the passageway, and I had view of my youngest walking ahead of us in the crowd, so, after we'd been stopped from walking, he was carrying on ahead of us, so, I had to yell at the top of my voice xxxxxxx and chase after him before he vanished out of the building.

At this point the Customs Officer decided that as a family, he didn't need to examine my cases, but one minute previously, as a couple, he did.

Sanji

It seems an amazing amount of coincidences to get through the different checks , and no one seemed to notice he was on his own , it looks like he managed to attach himself to a family when going through each check , as they would hand over passports and boarding cards and through all these checks it has been assumed that he was with a family .
To gain access to the security area and departure lounge a boarding card has to be presented , passports are not required that is done at checkin , I suppose he went through this check with a family who had handed over their boarding cards , and they wrongly thought he was with the family , he probably did go through the archway metal detector and onwards into the lounge , then onto the departure gate once again attaching himself to a family to gain access and onto the plane with cabin crew still believing he was with someone else .

It seems incredible that no one seems to notice and no one wonders where his parent(s) are , wouldn't someone notice if a child was hanging around with you and your family ?

There are serious mistakes and assumptions made in allowing this child to go through the checks in place and someone is going to be in real trouble , at least the CCTV will show how this managed to happen and how it can be avoided . Or if you have an 11 year old go off in a huff check the local airport if it's about 3 miles away .

It's an almost unbelievable story, in so many ways.