Buckle Up - It's Going to Be a Bumpy Ride...



Last year when I flew to NYC, I flew Delta.

After the experience of STILL sitting on the ground

at my home airport,

a couple of hours after

I should have been on the ground at New York,

I opted for a different airline this year.

Lesson learned...flying is not what is used to be.

We started out great.

The first leg of my trip was to Charlotte.

 

Up in the air and on time!

I caught my connecting flight to La Guardia.

It looked like I would be there, on time at 3 PM.

Kate's company has summer hours,

so she would meet me at the airport.

About a hour into the flight

the captain announces major storms in the New York area

and that we had actually been circling for a while.

Since we were over Richmond and

we were almost out of fuel,

we would land, refuel, and hopefully

the storms would be cleared by the time

we landed in New York.

I have no problem with Richmond,

unless, I'm sitting there all afternoon and into the evening.

We had numerous updates:

**major storms,

**all three New York airports closed,

**AND some sort of major communication outage

in the northeast.

At 8 PM (remember, I should have been in NY at 3 PM),

we were told our flight was cancelled.

Our choices were:

1.  Fly back to Charlotte, where there were no more flights

to NY that evening, BUT there were hotel rooms.

2.  Fly to Pittsburgh, where there were no more flights

to NY that evening, BUT there were hotel rooms,

AND the airline was working on adding another flight

in the morning into La Guardia,

OR putting us on a bus into the city that night.

(By the way, because of a convention in Richmond,

there were no hotel rooms available,

so staying there was not an option.)

What to do?

I opted to fly on to Pittsburgh.

My logic was to keep moving north,

not to back tract.

Back in the air to Pittsburgh.

There were forty of us and

upon landing we were met by

an airline representative.

He had NO knowledge of

the possible extra morning flight,

or the possible bus into NY.

Instead we were given small cards

with an 800 number for rebooking our flight

and a slip of paper with an 800 number

for getting a hotel room.

(I'm going to date myself,

but I remember a time when

airlines did both these things for you.)

Around midnight I had finally booked a seat for myself

the next morning on a arriving flight into JFK at 10:30 AM.

Not too happy about that because I knew

it would take me much longer to get  into the city,

and I was watching my weekend tick away.

But, I was very happy to have the seat.

Then I tried finding a room for the night.

It seems by that time, there no more rooms

at "trip interruption discounted rates", but I could

"try calling individual hotels" for a full price room.

Since it now well past midnight

and I had a 9:30 flight out in the morning,

and I was totally flustrated and disgusted,

I opted to stay at the airport,

 with most of the other 40 passengers from the flight.

We WERE given pillows and blankets,

and bottled water.

(By that time nothing was open at the airport.

Many of us had not had a real meal since breakfast.)

Yea US Airways!

Next moring at 5 AM I discover my flight has been

"pushed back" a couple of hours.

Back to my 800 number and

in my nicest, most desperate and pleading voice,

explained to the rep my saga/situation.

She was able to rebook me onto a 8:30 flight into...

...Philadelphia...

with connections...

into LaGuardia !!!

Arrival time: 10:30 AM!!!

ONLY 19 and a half hours late

and a night on the Pittsburgh airport floor!!!

I understand weather happens,

communication failures happen,

planes have mechanical problems,

and a whole host of other things

can occur when you travel.

Therefore it seems, the airlines would be models for

handling unhappy customers.

(A tray of sandwiches at the Pittsburgh airport

would have gone a long way.)

No, not the case.

At any rate, NYC was fun,

and I had a great visit with Kate.

The icing on the cake was getting a recorded

phone message 15 minutes before heading to

the airport Monday morning for my return trip

that my flight had been cancelled...

If you're traveling this weekend,

have fun, travel safe, and don't forget to

pack your patience!