Tuesday, March 18, 2008

3 Hours of Delay

Count me as another frustrated traveler. I flew out of NY's LaGuardia Airport today to Chicago O'Hare. The original itinerary was, fly out of NY LGA at 10:35AM EST and arrive at Chicago O'Hare at 12:20 central time. But, that was the original plan...below is what exactly happened.

I arrived at LaGuardia at 9:30AM. A full hour ahead of my departure time just like the TSA recommended. Boarding was scheduled to be at 10:05AM. Around 10:20AM, we were told that there's a instrument issue that will delay us a bit. Eventually we boarded the plane at 10:30AM. Not bad.

But, when 10:35AM rolled around, we were told that technicians have to be call in to check on the instrument issue. After about 25 minutes, the doors were closed and we were about to push off. A few minutes later, we were told that one of the door sensors wasn't working. The sensor shows the door as open when it was closed. Of course we can't fly with a faulty sensor. The technician is called out again.

Another 30 minutes passed. The sensor fixed, we pushed off. However, we were 27th in line to take off. Ouch. After waiting for 45 minutes, the plane veered off from the take off line. Apparently, Chicago is raining, they issued a ground stop for planes heading there.

Another 45 minutes later, the ground stop is lifted, but we lost our spot in the take off line. Oh boy. We get back in line. Finally at 1:20PM EST, we took off. That's nearly 3 hours after the original itinerary. 3 HOURS!

I'm not sure who to blame, American Airline for having faulty instrument panel and door sensor, or LaGuardia for allowing 27 airplanes to wait for take off, or Chicago for issuing a ground stop for rain. I hope my flight home is much less eventful.

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