by "notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
Published 06/17/2017 at 02:39
by "notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
Published 06/17/2017 at 02:39
No Tags
STARS: 4
1. Arrive at Pittsburgh Airport at 4:00 for 5:45 flight and enjoy a coffee. Watch how quickly this goes bad, dear reader, and see if you can catch the twist at the end of the story beforehand.
2. Walk over to security. Realize flight has been delayed 1.5 hours. Go have a smoke or few.
3. Get ready to go through security again. Notice a pattern of American Airlines adding a half hour to departure estimate every half hour. Continue to smoke, continue to drink coffee, and buy a sandwich from a newsstand, since that is all there is to eat before security. After 4 delays, question whether the flight will leave at all.
4. After 4 hours of delays, the flight is scheduled to leave at 10. This one seems to stick. Go to security at 8:40 and pull up boarding pass on phone. Or more specifically, pull up a “we’re sorry, we’re having a problem displaying this page” error from American Airlines. Oops. Get denied passage.
5. Go up to ticketing. Use the kiosk. “We’re having a problem with this reservation, please see an agent.” (Find out later that the kiosk would need to regenerate a new boarding pass, which it is not allowed to do after scheduled boarding, let alone 4hr later.) Promptly walk to the ticketing counter for a boarding pass, which is closed.
6. Immediately call AA. Wait on hold. Walk to TSA and ask what to do. They say go talk to someone in baggage services. Realize this is indeed a lot of baggage.
7. Walk across the whole damn airport to baggage services, who says to try the counter. Explain it is closed. They say they will try to print the pass but their printer hasn’t worked in 6 weeks. Splendid.
8. Finally hear from customer service who explains I shouldn’t be in baggage services but at the counter. After a recap of the situation they suggest “finding a team member at a different location but not baggage services.” Explain (less than calmly) the only team members left in the airport are on the secure side of the check point, and that to talk to them I would also need to be on the secure side of the checkpoint, which would require I have a boarding pass. Ask if they see a problem since it is now 45 mins till takeoff for a flight I waited 5 hours to board. Get transferred and put on hold.
9. Baggage services puts out a general page to the whole airport. They say wait at the ticket counter. Eventually hear from customer service that they’ve instructed a gate agent to meet me there as well. Go back to ticketing.
10. After 15 mins, surprise, no one comes. Airport security comes by, who puts out a second general page. No one comes. It is now 25 mins till takeoff.
11. A woman comes by who asks why you seem so frazzled. Indulge the request. She replies “oh wait you’re still here? I met you in the news kiosk 4 hours ago.” Strike up a conversation, which draws the attention of patrolling county police, as a passenger and a news kiosk employee chatting at an empty American Airlines ticket counter is somewhat unusual. Both offer to help since it is 20 mins to takeoff. The PD goes to baggage services, the news stand employee offers to cross security and try to retrieve a printed pass at the gate. Ponder the purpose of American Airlines.
12. The PD comes back quickly with a baggage services member waving a boarding pass. 15 mins till showtime. They put a gate hold on the plane, and the PD offers an escort through security so as not to miss the flight.
13. Sweating profusely, fly through security. Laptop out shoes off bags on rollers slam it all through. Get dressed and grab the bags, because that plane isn’t waiting forever. Shake hands with PD and book it.
14. Arrive at gate. Scheduled departure already pushed back to 10:25. Because of course.
15. Board plane at 10:25. Wait. Wait. Wait. At 11, captain informs you that the plane will taxi and sit on the Tarmac to burn fuel for 40 mins as they overfilled it and it is now overweight.
16. Airborne at 11:45, 6 hours late. Sit on plane through not one not two but three attempted landings into LaGuardia before they finally get it at 1:30, 6.5 hours late.
17. Be glad this shit is finally over. Grab the bags, and the... the... hmm...... something is missing. You know you had it when... But...
[retracing steps]
[”laptop out shoes off bags on rollers slam it all through. Get dressed and grab the bags...”]
[”...grab the bags...”]
Ah, shit.
"Krill Baby Krill" (krillbkrill)
06/17/2017 at 03:26, STARS: 1
Well, at least you are home and safe.
"pip bip - choose Corrour" (hhgttg69)
06/17/2017 at 03:50, STARS: 2
Can’t help it but I have to laugh
"AuthiCooper1300" (rexrod)
06/17/2017 at 06:05, STARS: 1
That policeman was no less than an angel.
Have you been able to recover your computer?
"Wagon Guy drives a Boostang" (gimmeboost)
06/17/2017 at 06:15, STARS: 2
And you know that in teh 6 hours you sat and waited for a plane, you could have driven from Pittsburgh to LaGuardia...
"ptak appreciates old racecars" (racecarptak)
06/17/2017 at 06:19, STARS: 1
That’s not gone well.
Custom Volga coupe for your troubles
"Berang" (berang)
06/17/2017 at 06:40, STARS: 0
When people tell me there’s no point taking the train...
"deekster_caddy" (deekster_caddy)
06/17/2017 at 07:39, STARS: 1
Any drive less than 12 hours and I’ll take the drive. Boston to Pitt can be done in 10, flying there can easily take 6. I’ll drive whenever possible.
"JawzX2, Boost Addict. 1.6t, 2.7tt, 4.2t" (jawzx2)
06/17/2017 at 07:42, STARS: 1
maybe in Europe (or even Canada), but here in the USA our train service is terrible and gets delayed all the time due to technical difficulties, and even more frequently track priority conflicts with freight. There are almost no dedicated passenger rail lines in the US outside of major metropolitan areas and freight service is more profitable for the rail owners, so if there’s a use conflict, its the passenger service that waits. That said, the train does have big comfy seats and it sucks far less than bus travel.
"arl" (arl1968)
06/17/2017 at 08:21, STARS: 3
“Ponder the purpose of American Airlines.” You are neither the first, nor the last.
You have my sympathies.
"shop-teacher" (shop-teacher)
06/17/2017 at 08:29, STARS: 1
Uugggghhhhhh!!!!!!
"WilliamsSW" (williamssw)
06/17/2017 at 09:50, STARS: 0
That. Sucks. Today will be better.
"TheRealBicycleBuck" (therealbicyclebuck)
06/17/2017 at 10:22, STARS: 0
I’ve traveled a lot for work. The most important thing I’ve learned is to ALWAYS print out a boarding pass the day before. It’s the only way to be sure I can get through security.
"FTTOHG Has Moved to https://opposite-lock.com" (alphaass)
06/17/2017 at 10:32, STARS: 0
I also leanred the hard way once that if your flight is delayed for hours it is best to go through security and wait on the gate side. It doesn’t make any sense but unfortunately the whole system isn’t set up to accommodate the possibility that people will show up later than the originally scheduled departure time. It used to be there were places to smoke on the secure side, but I quit smoking some time ago and don’t know if that is still the case.
"xy0001" (xy0001)
06/17/2017 at 10:51, STARS: 1
There’s nothing quite so reliably unreliable as American air travel. At least you had people that actually helped.
"facw" (facw)
06/17/2017 at 11:23, STARS: 0
Pittsburgh to New York is actually close to something not awful. Amtrak owns the Northeast Corridor, and the section from Harrisburg to Philadelphia (and both are electrified). If service didn’t suck between Pittsburgh and Harrisburg you might be able to do something useful. But alas, trains from Pittsburgh are sucky.
"facw" (facw)
06/17/2017 at 11:26, STARS: 0
You skipped the common “wait on the tarmac at LGA for an hour or two for some reason” step. Normally they at least make you wait 20 minutes for a jetway driver.
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/17/2017 at 11:31, STARS: 0
I asked American if they could fly me to Philly that night at any time and I’d drive the last leg. Sold out. I was there on business and they didn’t want to pay us to drive it. 6 hours I probably woulda driven if it was a personal trip but that’s about the cutoff for me.
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/17/2017 at 11:32, STARS: 1
Indeed I have learned
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/17/2017 at 11:34, STARS: 0
I live like 5 mins from LaGuardia and apparently am unique in that I’ve never had a problem with arrivals there.
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/17/2017 at 11:34, STARS: 1
I’m home now! Can’t be worse
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/17/2017 at 11:54, STARS: 1
I called last night and they said no. But I called today and they said yes!!
"facw" (facw)
06/17/2017 at 11:56, STARS: 0
Seriously feels like every time for me. I’d say airline choice, might matter, but I’ve had issues with United, Delta, and US Air (haven’t flown them into LGA since the merger, so maybe AA does things better?)
"wiffleballtony" (wiffleballtony)
06/17/2017 at 12:45, STARS: 1
I absolutely hate dealing with airports.
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/17/2017 at 12:48, STARS: 0
American air or American Air? And yes thank god for both those people or I’d still be in Pittsburgh
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/17/2017 at 12:51, STARS: 0
Well this was AA. I’ll pay almost any sum to fly JetBlue, but Delta has worked out for me in a bind. I was told it doesn’t matter your carrier or airport, nothing from Pitt to New York ever leaves on time in the evening.
"xy0001" (xy0001)
06/17/2017 at 15:20, STARS: 0
As in traveling by air in America.
By the way, this story has convinced me to never go to Pittsburgh.
"chid" (chid)
06/19/2017 at 10:49, STARS: 3
What if they made the entire scheduling/security/boarding process out of the black box material?
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/19/2017 at 11:01, STARS: 0
Clearly it already is
"ateamfan42" (ateamfan42)
06/19/2017 at 16:51, STARS: 0
Or more specifically, pull up a “we’re sorry, we’re having a problem displaying this page” error from American Airlines.
As nice and convenient as technology can be, I have a special distrust of online services being available when I really need them. Network errors, server crashes, incompetent system administrators, sunspots, and power outages can all conspire against you.
Paper copies for critical travel documents are a hard to beat back up. It is the same reason I record confirmation numbers for all online transactions. When they say “the computer has no record of you”, I can at least counter with a code number that shows the computer did in fact know about me at some point in the past.
"notsomethingstructural" (notsomethingstructural)
06/19/2017 at 20:40, STARS: 1
I had a reservation number on hand but it didn’t matter. The issue was getting it printed. The lesson is print the damn boarding pass as soon as I get to the airport and thats not a mistake to be repeated.