Passengers hoped that this flight would allow them to “travel back in time” and celebrate the New Year twice… but they got in the wrong year

(CNN) — Passengers on a United Airlines flight hoping to “travel back in time” to celebrate the New Year got an unfortunate start to 2024.

Flight UA200 was originally scheduled to depart Guam at 7:35 a.m. on January 1, 2024, and land in Honolulu, Hawaii, at 6:50 p.m. on December 31, 2023, a year earlier to carry passengers across time zones. I had to travel.

“You only live once, but you can celebrate New Year’s Eve twice!” United Airlines had tweeted Earlier that week. In another Instagram post about flight UA200, he wrote: “Time travel is real.”

Each year, a handful of flights offer passengers the chance to relive their New Year’s Eve celebrations, and airline employees sometimes celebrate the occasion multiple times on the same route.

But the passengers of UA200 were disappointed. The flight was delayed, departing Guam at 1:49 pm on January 1 and arriving in Honolulu at 12:34 pm on January 1, missing the countdown.

Many passengers later expressed their complaints, first on Twitter.

“Great idea, too bad it got delayed! I had to be on this flight. Double New Year’s no longer possible,” one person wrote beneath United Airlines’ original tweet.

Another comment read, “I booked this flight specifically so I could do this.” “I received a delay notice and we are not scheduled to arrive until 1/1.”

The airline responded immediately by offering passengers assistance with re-booking.

Passengers on other one-off flights had better luck: for example, Cathay Pacific flight CX872, which departed Hong Kong shortly after 1 pm on January 1 and arrived in San Francisco at 8:22 pm on December 31; and All Nippon Airways flight NH106, which departed Tokyo at 12:48 am on January 1 and landed in Los Angeles at 5:12 pm on December 31.