Airline Horror Story 12/10/08

The Day………

........started out early, I hadn’t slept the best because I didn’t take a sleeping pill the night before, so I was up early. My dad leaves for work around 5:30 in the morning, and I heard him puttering around in the kitchen, and never really fell back asleep. I got up officially just before 7 and joined my mom for breakfast. After she left for work, I finished packing my bags, I got dressed and ready to go. I cleaned out my purse even.

I left the house around 9, I was driving to my Uncle Clark & Aunt Judy’s house so I could park my car there for the week and they chauffeured me to the airport. Got there around 1 and my flight was scheduled to leave at 3:05.

Well, the earlier flight for that day was still there when I got to the gate, as were two flights to Cleveland. All were having issues with weather, but in other locations and thus the planes weren’t coming to Indianapolis on time. I should have taken that as a sign I guess, but I was pretty confident that with two hours to kill, my plan would be ok. Plus, the counter people assured me, it would be on time.

Little did I know……….

I boarded my plan approximately 30 minutes late due to the three other above mentioned flights using our gate and coming in/out first. Figured 30 minutes was no big deal, right?

We take off and are in the air on our way to Houston, which is my scheduled layover before coming to Sacramento. Just before our arrival in Houston, the captain comes on the overhead speaker system and announces due to weather in Houston, they are placing planes in a holding pattern until it clears a little. Holding pattern means you make big circles in the sky……..along with a bunch of other airplanes. At one point, I counted seven of us circling, and that was just what I could see from my window, I am sure there were more.

So we circle, for about twenty minutes. The captain again comes on the overhead speaker system and announces that he is trying to contact flight control, we need to land now or we have to divert to go get more fuel. Groan!

So we began flying south and eventually landed at Ellington AFB. Now being that this isn’t a normal commercial airport, what do you suppose the fuel charge was there? DORKS! Don’t you think you could plan for this sort of thing?

Thirty minutes later, we are back in the air towards Houston and this time, they promptly allow us to land. Now originally, I had a little less than two hours layover time, by the time we taxied into our gate, I was down to 28 minutes and I had gate checked a bag, so I had to wait for it before I could be off. Mine was fifth off the car, thankfully, so I walked as fast as I could up the ramp and asked the agent what gate my next flight was at. “E23” he says. I was like, okay. Until I went to the main walkway of the airport, which had no walking escalators by the way, and realized I was at B66 and E23 was a long way off! Now I broke my toe two weeks ago and for the most part, it doesn’t bother me except when you try to run. When you run, you use your toes. That wasn’t working so well, so I was doing a half walk, half (barely) jog to try to get to E23 when I realize the terminals aren’t connected and I need to take a Tram over to the main airport. Sigh! Could this day get worse?

So I got on the tram and it is semi-fast, so I was figuring I’d be okay. We went to C terminal, stopped. We were then on our way again to stop at D & E terminals. Yeah, that wasn’t so bad! Only, it’s the entrance to the airport, so it’s just the beginning of these terminals. “Oh Dear Lord, I need to make my plane!” I say.

So, I begin walking as fast as I can across the airport, headed for terminal E. Finally a walking escalator comes into view. I hop on, twice and end up at E12. I was thinking, “Oh my goodness, I still have a long ways to go!” As I rounded the corner, gate E24 comes into view. “YES!” The gates now go backwards and I am only two away. “Thank you Lord Jesus!”

The gals waiting at the check in kiosk see me coming and smile as I come huffing up to the podium. “Just in time,” they say. I told them, “I came from B terminal and could it have been any farther away?”

So I board the plane, thankfully my seat is the first row after first class, so I didn’t have to wiggle through the whole plane. I sit down next to a couple and they notice my breathing. They greet me and congratulate me for making it. I grab a few things from my bag and get settled in. I offer them a peanut butter kiss, which I promptly learn, does not have the same name in every country. In Australia, they are called cyclops cookies because they look like they have an eye, one eye. Cute huh?

A few minutes later, they close the door to the plane and we back away for the gate. This is the beginning of a five hour wait on the tarmac. You see, it was snowing in Houston. One of few days a year this ever happens. Planes need to be de-iced. It was going to be awhile.

So I am sitting in the row directly behind first class, aisle seat. I am sitting next to a real nice American couple who currently live in Australia. They were very nice. It was a good thing we got along; the next nine hours we spent together were long, but amusing.

So after rolling away from the gate, the captain comes on the overhead and says we are going to just wait a little bit on the tarmac as there is a little backup. Little, yeah right! I swear, they load you up on a plane, trapped like sardines in a tin can, to make you sit on the tarmac. Why of why can we not sit in the airport where we have access to food and bathrooms? Seriously!

So we sit. And we sit some more. And we sit some more. Finally, the captain comes on again and says we are moving to the runway. Hurray! Right? Not so much. He comes on and says that we have to wait to be deiced. I am thinking, okay, this is a good thing, the flakes are huge and building up rapidly, I am sure that affects the way the plane flies. Well, little did I know that Houston barely gets any snow, so they only have once de-icer. ONE! At this point, we didn’t know where we were in the line, just that we were in it and waiting our turn. The flight attendants decide to pass out the headsets at this point and not charge the normal $1 fee. Sweet!

An hour later, the captain comes overhead again and says because of the delay, they are going to let us have beverage service while on the ground. Cool, I was getting thirsty. A few minutes after that, he announces we would do food service too. Okay, I think, it will help pass the time. A few minutes after that, he comes on again and retracts both the food and drink. We think, “Sweet, we are out of here!” Uh, not so much!

So five minutes after that, he comes on yet again and says we are pulling ahead a few hundred yards and then they would begin food and beverage service. Turns out, we are now eighth in line and it is taking twenty minutes per plane to be de-iced. This means we have nearly three hours before it is our turn. Great, just great!

So the meal is a chicken enchilada, only it is not like any enchilada I have ever had. It had rice, chicken, cheese, onions, jalapenos, corn and tomatoes. Weird! I ended up dumping everything out and ate just the tortilla which still had the cheese and rice attached. Not too bad. We also had a lettuce salad and a Twix bite-sized bar for dessert.

So about two and a half hours later, it is our turn. The captain has to turn off the engine and the overhead air so the stuff doesn’t come in the plane. Well, you can still smell it and it smells like burnt antifreeze. Not the best smell in the world.

We finally get to taxi to the runway and take off. We all clap! Yeah, we are in the air. I finally decide to get some rest, it is now 9pm and I have been up since about 5am. I am ready for a nap. I wake up about two and a half hours later. I decide to break out my book and read for awhile. We still had about an hour or so to our destination. The captain comes on the overhead. Are you kidding me? Folks, we have to make a detour to Las Vegas to refuel. After five hours sitting on the tarmac, they apparently thought we still had enough when we left Houston, but nope! Our captain underestimated fuel due to what he said was tough headwinds. Right…………seriously?

So, we have to land in Vegas. I asked our flight attendant if there was any chance that we’d get to go to the casino. Nope, we didn’t even go to a gate. So about forty-five minutes later we are back in the air headed to Sacramento once again.

We land without difficulty and finally, after nine hours of sitting in a sardine can, we deplane. Mark is waiting for me at the bottom of the escalator and I was never so happy to see my brother in my whole life. It was 3am on Thursday, I had been up almost hours. We head toward the baggage carousels and wait for luggage to start appearing.

Luggage comes after about fifteen minutes. I anxiously await my bag. I had barely made the plane in Houston; I was worried my luggage didn’t. Well, I had reason to worry. I watched everyone else’ back go round and round on the carousel. There were no bags left and I and three others were still standing there. Uh oh! We walk over to the check in counter to check with the Continental staff about my bag. All bags are off the plane, no bags in the back. It did not come on an earlier flight, it was likely on the next flight, which wasn’t due until about 5:30am. We opt not to wait at the airport and fill out a claim tag to have my bag delivered to Mark’s apartment once it gets to Sacramento.

We depart the airport and head for Walmart, it is now nearly 4am and I have no clothes. I had to buy pajamas, a pair of underwear and a shirt. I wanted to be safe as I wasn’t sure when my bag would arrive at Mark’s. Well, good thing I played it safe. My bag did not arrive until later in the day and I left Mark’s around 9am as my Grama and I had 10:30am nail appointments. These things are important you know! My bag did arrive, and that was the important thing, Mark brought it to me later.

So, I barely got any sleep, my body clock said “wakey, wakey!” at 7am, which would be 9am Central time, and I had only slept about two hours. I was tired, but couldn’t sleep. Don’t you just hate that?

Well, that is essentially the 24 hour horror story. I left out the details about keeping in touch with my family, but I was texting and making several phone calls along the way. Good thing nights and weekends are free! HA!

Thanks for reading! Feel free to post your airline horror stories!