Trappped on a plane for 4 hours on a runway- JETBLUE Trip Report

[JordanIB]

Interesting....I heard that there was an 11 hour ordeal at JFK with them 2 days ago.

[jba]

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FINE. I've been on the plane for 4 hours, I should already be in Denver, but I'll just book the next flight to Denver and leave in a hours. No big deal. We get into the dreadfully slow ticket lines, and after 20 minutes of waiting...

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you should be on the phone to the airline while waiting in line, you will usually be able to get through before you make it through the line. This is especially key if there are limited seats available in future flights.

this happened to me on a flight from bos -> texas or somewhere. I usually have a few beers and pop a benadryl before a long flight, so I zonked out as soon as I sat down. I woke up after a very restful sleep as we were rolling down the runway, I look at my watch and it's four hours later - sweet I slept through the whole flight! Then the plane lifted off.

[theBruiser500]

good post, sorry about what happened that is riduclous

[El Diablo]

OP,

That sucks, I was once on a plane for over 6 hours on the runway at JFK. We left the gate on time, but then were like 20th in line (big storms all over the midwest) and by the time we were near the start we had burned so much fuel we had to go back to the gate and refuel. Then we got back in line. When we were 2nd in line, the pilot said "Good news is we are 2nd in line. Bad news is crew goes illegal in 10 minutes, so if we are not in the air by then we have to go back and get a new crew." Luckily, we made it up.

Anyway, a few years ago I made a decision to not get pissed off in situations like this and just accept that it's out of my control and sleep or read a book and just not get stressed out about it. In the grand scheme of things, it doesn't really matter. Easier said than done, but since doing this, I've found my life to be a lot more relaxing.

[MicroBob]

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Hang out at FlyerTalk.com to get the best advice on what to do in your situation and future situations. Good luck.

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Checking other sites makes sense.

It seems like their incompetence pretty much ruined his vacation and they are also REALLY difficult to get a hold of or make different arrangements with.

I know this isn't a completely uncommon thing.
But is some kind of law-suit possible/appropriate for something like this?


I don't fly that much but I've gotten around.
I consider myself really fortunate that I haven't had a situation remotely this bad.

I've been stuck roaming around the Pittsburgh airport for several hours because of snow-storms. trying to get back from Boston. But Pittsburgh has a pretty decent mall in their airport so it's not too hard to kill that time.

And being stuck walking around an airport with a food-court and mall for even 10+ hours isn't remotely the same as sitting on a plane for hours, having the flight cancelled due to idiocy, and then not being able to arrange a new flight anytime in the immediate future.


On the other side of that:
Coming back from Quebec or Montreal on Continental (I think) they determine that they are over-booked.
They need to bump us to a different flight on Northwest with a connection in Detroit instead of Cleveland or something (no big deal at all).

The flight leaves 10 minutes EARLIER than the one I was supposed to take. So I have to kind of hustle.
Additionally, they are 'forced' to put us in first-class. Sorry about that. They don't charge me anything extra for that.


And, for the inconvenience of getting me home faster and making me sit in 1st class they give us a voucher for a future round-trip flight.

It was bizarre. I didn't ask for any of it. I kept agreeing and they kept giving me more.
"Oh, leave 10 minutes earlier. No problem."
"Oh, sit in first-class? Wow, that's really cool, thanks."
"Ummm, 'inconvenience' so you are giving us round-trip vouchers? Wow. That's awesome."

[tedtodd]

People are trying to pass a "Passengers Bill of Rights" that prevents things like this from happening, or atleast provides better accommodations.

Also, it looks like I'm getting a free roundtrip voucher out of this in addition to my refund. They wouldnt do it yesterday, but it seems they changed their mind.

Still sucks, my bro is super bummed that I couldn't make it out there. He took yesterday and today off from work. As did my buddies bro who lives out there. JetBlue ruined alot of vacations with this one.

[dlk9s]

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Wow thankfully i have never had to deal with this in my whole life, and ive flown like 16 times in my life at least. Sorry to hear about this, and i know now to stick with Southwest.

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Holy [censored], with all that travel, how do you ever find time to just relax at home?

[PokerAmateur4]

[Apoc]

Had the same thing happen to me back in 1999 when I was traveling a lot in my consulting job. Flying out of JFK on Continental Airlines, trying to beat the hurricane-force storms which were circling. Flight is packed, as there had been a few delays and cancellations, but they board us and we roll back from the gate and get in line.

After an hour of sitting there, the passengers are starting to get a little anxious, at which point they tell us that they don't know how long we're going to be waiting, but we have to be ready to go at a moment's notice because if there's a flight path out through the storm, we may make a run for it. The nasty side effect of being ready to go is that no beverage service or bags of peanuts or anything, and this was a dinner-time flight back when a little meal was still served on a plane.

Going into hour two of waiting and the crowd is getting more restless. At this point, they tell us they still don't know when we'll be leaving, but to pacify the increasingly angry mob, they're going to show the movie planned for the flight. Headsets will be $3. I thought some of the passengers were gonna jump out of their seats and throttle the flight attendants at that news. You could hear the collective groan from the plane. About ten seconds after that, the flight attendant got back on the PA system, letting us know that the headsets would be free. Mutiny avoided.

Enter hour four on the tarmac. At this point, we're all pretty thirsty and starving, as no service has been allowed. The claustrophobia was finally starting to get to people, as one women ran screaming down the aisle of the plane that she's sure that it's a conspiracy and she can see the Port Authority outside the plane and she wants off immediately. More yelling and screaming, and the flight attendants are able to calm folks down.

Enter hour five, and the pilot lets us know that we've been waiting for so long that we don't have enough fuel to make the flight, so we're going back to the gate. Hmmm...that sucks, but I guess I'd rather get more fuel than only make it halfway home in the air. So, back we go and they give us the option to get off the plane if we want and cancel entirely. Just about everyone gets off the plane, and not ten minutes after we deplane, we see jets taking off from the window of the gate. What the hell!?! Just then, they let us know that we're all getting back on board and leaving immediately. We all herd back onto the plane, push back, and wait in line for another 15-20 minutes before revving the engines and taking off. Four hours later, and well past when I was supposed to be home, we land and happily stumble off the plane. One of the worst flying experiences I've had, to say the least, but at least I wasn't the crazy conspiracy lady on the plane.

Apoc

[oyesmoreofthis]

somebody call the WAAAAAHHMBULANCE.