Next time I’ll drive

The US Department of Transportation says in the first three months of this year, airfare was .6-percent less than the same time last year. Well that's fantastic. While we get less service on flights and airlines struggle to deal with weather, equipment, computer and personnel problems, we're saving a few pennies for the privilege of being inconvenienced by giant corporations.

My latest travel experience is a perfect example of everything that is wrong with the American air travel industry. It was a nightmare marathon of delays and disappointments that ended 26.5 hours after it all began.

When I woke up Sunday morning in a hotel in Philadelphia, I decided to see if there was an earlier alternative to my 6:10 p.m. flight from Philadelphia to Wilmington. I called USAir at about 8:30 a.m. and found out that most of the flights were booked. There were, however, seats on a 9:30 a.m. flight, but I knew there would be no way to make it to the airport in time. So I decided I would just get some more sleep and then spend the afternoon in my favorite city, perhaps at the Phillies-Pirates game that afternoon with friends.

When I woke up again around 10 a.m., I turned on the TV and found out about severe weather warnings ahead of a line of strong storms heading toward Philadelphia. Knowing that I needed to wake up at 1:30 the next morning as usual to get to work, I decided I needed to check again on a different flight. Another call to USAir told me that there was one seat left on a 3:35 flight from PHL to ILM. The operator said it would cost me $100 to change the ticket plus the difference in value between my original ticket and the new one minus the value of my ticket. "The total is $834.35," he said. "Should I go ahead and make the change?"

Needless to say, I passed on spending the equivalent of a new computer or television. Instead, I asked the guy if he could put me on the stand-by list for the 3:35 flight. He said I needed to be at the airport to do that. So I finished packing my bag, raced downstairs and up the street to a train station and rode down to the airport. There I was able to reserve that last available seat on the earlier flight for a $25 change fee. Not $834. $25. Why is it that everyone you talk to about airfare gives you a different price?

Anyway… with my new ticket in hand, I still had about four hours to kill before boarding now leaving too early to go to the Phillies game I figured would be rained-out anyway. While wandering around the airport, that strong line of storms rolled through. It would turn out to be the only storms that would hit Philadelphia all day, and it would cause a handful of short delays. Unfortunately other parts of the country weren't so lucky. Bad storms caused delays up and down the east coast. It wasn't long before my 3:35 flight was pushed back to 4:20. I passed some of that additional time by grabbing a bite to eat in a restaurant airport, where I watched part of the Phillies game. Yes. The skies had cleared, and it was a great afternoon for baseball.

That new 4:20 departure soon gave way to 5:10. We did indeed get on the plane around 5 p.m. and pushed back a few minutes later. Even though we were late and I had spent my day at the airport, I was still on target to make it home earlier than orginally planned. Relaxed, I dozed off as we taxied toward the runway. When I woke up some time later, we were on the ground. But when I looked out the window, I knew we weren't in Wilmington. We were still in Philadelphia sitting on the runway. It was about 5:40 p.m. 15 minutes later, we moved about 100 yards. 20 minutes later, another short roll. We did it again about 15 minutes after that. Eventually, the pilot told us that the route we were supposed to use to get home was shut down because of storms. Air traffic control was working on a new route for us, but there was the possibility we'd need to go back for more fuel. More time passed with little movement and few updates.

At one point I sent my fiancee a text message pointing out that if I'd driven and left the hotel at the same time, I would have been home already. The next message told her that we wouldn't need fuel for the time being and that once a plane heading to Chicago that couldn't take off moved out of our way, we'd be ready to go. So we moved up to the take-off line. We sat there for a couple of minutes before the plane started to roll too slowly for take-off. Instead, we turned left and got back in line. Air traffic control closed our updated route just as we were about to take off. Back to the waiting, the flight attendant served drinks. Nearly two hours of patience sitting on the plane rewarded with an iceless cup of Coke. I asked the flight attendant at what point they would cancel our flight because the crew had been on duty too long. She assured me they had five hours or so left before that would happen.

After about three hours sitting on the tarmac, the pilot told us we were going back to the gate. That was it. We didn't know if we were getting more fuel, just going to wait or if the flight was cancelled. Back at the gate, the flight attendant opened the door and ushered everyone off without explanation. In the terminal, no one was waiting to tell us what was going on. Finally, we started drifting toward lines to rebook what we assumed was a cancelled flight. We were right. I lucked out and scored the last seat on a 10:40 p.m. flight to Raleigh-Durham that was already delayed until 11:20. That meant more than two hours to kill before boarding. Though not thrilled about the late-night trip, my fiancee agreed to drive to RDU to get me with a plan to leave with our dog around 10:30.

Waiting at the gate for the RDU flight, I met a man in a worse situation I was. He and his young son were waiting for stand-by space on the flight, as were several people from my ILM flight. But this man had bigger problems. He, his wife and their four kids were on their way back from vacation in the Virgin Islands. He and his son were supposed to be on this flight from PHL to RDU, but the airline moved them to an earlier flight, which they, of course, missed. His wife and three daughters wound up at JFK Airport in New York. American Airlines had to split them up. Mom and one daughter would stand by for a flight. Their 19- and 13-year-old daughters were booked on a flight out of LaGuardia. But when they took a cab to the other side of Long Island, they found out there was only one seat for the two of them. Their Mom and sister, who took the stand-by option so if anyone were stranded it would be credit card-toting Mom, got seats on their flight and were on their way home. When I first saw Dad, he was on the phone with American exasperated trying to figure out how to get money to his girls or get them a hotel. In the end, they wound up having to sleep at the airport with no money for food to wait for a flight out the next morning.

Back in Philadelphia, we waited for a plane to arrive to get us to RDU. 11:20 was apparently a pie-in-the-sky hope. We started worrying when the flight across the hall was told the flight crew arriving at our gate from Washington, DC, would take them to upstate New York. Both flights worried more when that crew and plane, which should have arrived less than an hour after taking off from DC, was missing in action. When the plane finally arrived, a ground crew member told the New York passengers that, after hours of waiting for the flight crew, their flight was cancelled. One woman broke into tears as the other passengers lined up to be rebooked and other workers starting setting out drinks, snacks and pillows for the long night ahead.

As for my flight, the airline finally told us that one of the flight crews arriving soon at two adjacent gates would be for us. To say the least, we were skeptical. But we watched with hope as a plane landed nextdoor and the crew members grabbed their bags and walked across the tarmac to our plane. Still, we worried. the stand-by folks, including a businessman from Buffalo heading for Myrtle Beach, who sat next to me during that three-hour wait on the ILM flight, were unsure if they'd be able to leave. 49 of 50 seats were checked-in, the airline told them. My new friend the businessman was #16 on the stand-by list. But we only counted about 35 people in the gatehouse.

Finally, a little before 1 a.m. we boarded. I wished the businessman, the frustrated dad and others good luck. On the plane there was confusion. Apparently a computer glitch had deleted the passenger list. Those of us who heard about it reconfirmed our reservation and got new seat assignments. That meant there were doubled assignments on board. The crew, though, told us just to grab any seat. Soon, all the stand-by passengers boarded. We were on our way. Except we weren't going anywhere. The pilot told us that our plane, which had been sitting at the gate for about 40 minutes before we boarded, needed fuel. 20 minutes later, we had it. We still sat. The flight attendant finally told us we were nose-heavy, meaning two people in the front row needed to move to the back of the plane. They did, and a little while later, we pushed back from the gate.

At 1:35 a.m. we were finally, mercifully wheels up. It was the first time in hours that any of us actually believed we were going home. 62 minutes later, we landed at RDU. I had called my boss at 7:30 p.m. after sitting on the runway for 2.5 hours on that first plane to let him know I probably wouldn't make it to work in the morning. I thought it would be because I would just get into Wilmington too late to get any sleep. I never thought it would be because I was in Raleigh at the same time I normally arrive for my shift. Faced with that fact and the idea of that boring drive on I-40 back to the Port City, my fiancee managed to find a hotel that accepts pets so we could get some rest.

After getting that rest and driving home, I finally walked in my front door at 1:45 Monday afternoon, about 26.5 hours after I started my journey. Oh, by the way, remember that 6:10 p.m. flight to ILM I was originally on? While waiting in Philadelphia, I found out, even though my earlier flight was cancelled, it arrived here around 11 p.m. Sunday night. Fantastic.