Your Irregular Flying Experiences: Diverts, Emergencies, Delays, Oh my!

I was wondering what you folks have experienced in terms of what airlines call an "irregular operation", including things like diversion, extended delays, inflight emergencies or anything like that. How did the airline handle it?

I have had a couple things, but mostly as an employee of the airline. A plane breaking at an Air Force base in Qatar causing me to need to sleep in a tent on the base for a couple days was one thing (pretty amazing actually).

One time we were flying to NAS Sigonella in Sicily when the pilot had a minor argument with ATC after confusing directions and the controller put us to the back of the arrivals line. We didn't have enough gas for that so we diverted to Naples. A quick gas and go.

Both of the above brought about some great spotting opportunities (albeit visual with no pics), especially the times I spent in Qatar.

Not long ago I had a 2 hour 42 minute taxi out of JFK due to weather. Good pilot updates made it more tolerable for myself and the passengers.

I've had a ton of other odd experiences, but not much that I recall that caused any diversions or other craziness.

I like hearing how airlines have handled various situations over the years, so please share your stories!

In probably 2009 or 2010, I was headed back to Michigan from LGA on a Delta MD88. It was July 5th, and one of those typical New York heatwave weeks, where the temp at LGA hovered around 100'. They boarded us in very small groups so no one would have to wait in the unaircon'd jet bridge. Well, turns out it didn't matter. Just after takeoff, there was a weird smell and some smoke towards the rear of the cabin. Right after that, the worst thing happened, the air conditioner shut off. Because the pilots did not know what caused the malfunction, they decided not to continue on to DTW, instead circle around NYC to burn some fuel and go back to LGA. We circled, for about 45 minutes, in a disgusting metal tube with no air conditioning. It was nasty. We landed safely, Delta reps were at the gate to hand us vouchers, and we got a new plane within minutes.

Back in probably 2008, I was flying BUF-JFK in the middle of the winter. Normally, operations at Buffalo never slow down due to snow, but they do when your destination also has snow. We boarded on time, but missed out takeoff slot because deicing took longer than expected. We remained in the aircraft for a bit, eventually deiced again, but just like last time, missed our takeoff slot. Our next takeoff slot was not for several hours, so the pilot did something interesting. He went into the terminal, bought 125 sandwiches from the terminal, and had the crew distribute it to passengers. Uhm, yea....awesome. More time went on, and jetblue needed the gate, so we had a choice. Head back into the terminal and wait, or remain on the aircraft as we got a tour of the field. Of course, I stayed on board for the ride! We eventually got where we were going, but about 8 hours late...for a 45 minute flight.

Hey, at least it was a special!
http://i1341.photobucket.com/albums/...ps8dbb1b9a.jpg

Not sure this falls into this category, but I had an unpleasant xp with Delta (although survivable). Boarded at JFK on my way to BCN, and a "technical issue" required some work. It lasted over 3 hours, with 250 pax on board, without any information whatsoever (aside the technical issue part). Might sound like nothing, but people were getting a little anxious. At least give us some info, and ideally disembark us while you work on the a/c.

August 14 1996.... The scene.... a bustling LGA terminal, the time, 400PM..... An aunt and nephew sit at a food venue (which might I add had a etched glass wall mural of a Delta L1011) I look at our ticket and notice the flight number.... Delta 801..... This was mind you about a month after TWA 800 exploded and my aunt was a horrible flyer as it was..... So me being the dick I am even at like 10 years old had to make light of it to her.... Fast forward 2 hours.... we are pushing back from gate 4 in the Delta terminal in a 727 (one which had a snazzy looking 1996 summer olympics sticker on the fuse below the cheatline)... We take the runway after a 30 minute taxi and off we go down 13 at LGA.... Into the right turn and than at 2.4 into the left.... As we rolled out of the left turn we felt a pronounced thud followed by a clear reduction in accelleration and climb.... After about 5 minutes the captain comes on and explains that the number 2 had just experinced what he termed a very strong compressor stall and it potentally damaged the engine... As a result we were going to dump 15,000 pounds of fuel and divert to JFK..... So, off we went out off of Robert moses at what from memory I would estimate was less than 10,000 feet burning circles for 45 minutes or more while fuel came from the dump ports. (I was seated in 15F with a very clear view) We finally came around and flew an abbreviated visual to 13R where FD proceeded to examine the airplane... Later that night around 2AM when we landed in TPA there were a bunch of news cameras which at the time could still get to gate areas. It turned out later that the engine shat out about 20 pounds of fan blades on some guy who worked for the Ports car and house in Flushing.

Dude, I remember that on the news!

I've had 2 unplanned landings in roughly 125 commercial segments; SFO-EWR on an Eastern 757 sometime in the mid 80s diverted to MCI on a Medical, and TLV-JFK on an El Al 742 in August 1994 diverted to YMX (Montreal-Mirabel) for fuel. That was the only time I flew that segment westbound on the -200, but anecdotally, I've heard they rarely made the trip nonstop, despite what the timetable said!

I can also think of 2 go-arounds (LY 744 TLV-EWR 2002 and US 734 FLL-DCA 2007) and an RTO (FL DC9 ATL-PHL 1999), but those aren't as notable.

Back in '03, my grandmother passed away. I flew LAS-PHL-ISP on US to attend the funeral, and was booked the morning after the funeral to fly the reverse routing back to the LAS. The afternoon of my grandmother's funeral, a raging blizzard began and lasted through the night. Needless to say, my flight was cancelled, and I couldn't get re-booked on the return segments for 3 days after I was supposed to return. On top of all this, I had a cold when I left LAS, and from the pressure changes on the flights home, I got an ear infection in my right ear from the fluids apparently not draining properly in my inner ear. Oh, yeah....I had never taken ammoxocillan (sp?) prior to this, and I found out the hard way that I was allergic to this antibiotic after visiting my doc to have my ear checked out. Other than a funeral, a raging blizzard,a three day delay in my return, an ear infection, and an allergic reaction to an antibiotic, that trip was pretty un-eventful.......:eek:

Phil,
I have been digging for years to find articles or footage from it, I know they exist, there were a zillion news cameras both in NY and at TPA when we finally got in....
http://dms.ntsb.gov/aviation/Acciden...2013120000.pdf

Last record I can find for the bird has her listed as A6-RSA operating for a company called "Red Star" in Djibouti.

There's a listing for the 727 as UP-B2704 with "Mega Air" out of Kazakhstan. There's a picture of it online from February on the ramp at Fujeirah in the UAE with all of the hydraulics drooped. I was actually at Fuji about 2 months ago, but the whole place is a surrounded by a 20 foot wall and some very aggressive police, so I came away with nothing.

Recently on Jetblue, had a delayed flight so we booked standby on another. While at the gate on standby, the a/c at the gate for another flight went mechanical. They advised an 1 hr delay but started boarding 15 min later.

Underpromise, overdeliver!

A few years ago, had a rejected T/O on Jetblue at FLL. I did post about it a while back. About an hour delay but again, they over promised and under delivered. Also, they allowed passengers to get off the plane and stay overnight in case they didnt 'trust' the airplane!

October 2002. Flying AA MD-80 to LGA. About to land when a few feet over the runway, the pilot spooled up and took off again. The A/C did not clear the runway ahead so the PIC aborted with a few to touchdown.

I was elated but nearby PAX were complaining the pilot should have just landed (schmucks). The bonus for us was that we flew out to the GWB, left left along the Hudson and were afforded a view around all of Manhattan at 2200 feet. Toward the end of the island, I was afforded my first and only view of the twin tower footprints, all lit up from construction lights.

Lastly, were due to fly out of LHR, standby on AA on the day of this huge fuel explosion outside London. For the first few hours, people thought it was a terrorist act. Anyway, being lowly airline employee standbys, we took a chance. The flights were overbooked and we were given F class seats to JFK on an AA 777. Worth a days delay of travel

Awhile back, I was flying LGA-ATL on Eastern (I said it was awhile back) and we had to stop for fuel somewhere in the Carolinas (maybe CLT?). I have no idea how we didn't have enough fuel to make LGA-ATL.

In 2010 I was flying Cathay Pacific and had a mx issue on a 747 out of HKG cause a 6hr delay before boarding. Food vouchers and plenty of plane spotting made the time go fast.

Back in 1992, I was on an Air France A340 and had a nice 4hr on the plane delay due to mx. The plane was five days out of the factory and had the worst seat pitch I've ever encountered. After a few dozen reboots of the plane, we finally made it to JFK.

Flying Aeroflot domestically in the USSR, I was glad the Tu-154 has six wheels on each main gear since four of each six had cords showing. The recommendation was to try and sleep on the plane so that you wouldn't feel it when we crashed.

I've had many 3+ hour delays at JFK, some on the plane and some before boarding. I consider leaving JFK within a few hours of scheduled departure to be normal.

Got delayed 3hrs into SFO because SFO was landing the 19s (rare) and Obama was in town yet again screwing up air traffic.

A few medicals, but no diversions.

Surprisingly for all that I fly, I don't have a single go-around in a commercial plane. I make up for that when I'm PIC in a bugsmasher though.

Mother Nature involved in all my delays!!

Mid 90s/Feb heading to Florida from LGA with wife and 2 young sons. Nice snowstorm brewing as we taxied out to depart. Apparently we were in the line too long and they had to go back to the gate and de-ice! Oh this aint good I thought. But after the de-icing was over we taxied out again and departed Runway 4 to a beautiful and sunny Florida. Later heard the airport closed soon after we left!! Whew!!

July 2010, arrive JFK for our Air France flight to Paris w/connection to Rome!! SEVERE thunderstorms that afternoon but our flight was for 6PM and by 5PM skies were clearing!! What we didnt know was that our plane which was flying in from another location was hit by lightning!!!!!! So they had to do a meticulous check of the whole plane from stem to stern!! I'm thinking we aint getting out of here!! But around 10PM we started boarding and were up in the air by 11. Of course we missed our connection in Paris, had to rebook which went smoother than I anticipated. But our 3PM Alitalia flight to Rome was also delayed. Why? SEVERE thunderstorms in Paris!!! Were they following us across the Atlantic?? Eventually all went smoothly and we had to greatest time in Italy!!

Last October, in Tucson visiting my son for 4 days, big USC-UA football game (Upset by UA, woo hoo). But brewing and getting closer was Hurricane Sandy!! Thought I'd get out in time with a US Air 2:30 flight out of Phoenix on Sunday but wake up Sunday morning and that was cancelled!! In fact nothing flying into the area though somehow the NY Giants charter from Dallas was able to get in late, but anyways...... Finally rebooked a United flight on Thursday morning to Dulles with connection to LGA which just reopened on Thursday!! Left Tucson at 5AM for the ride to Phoenix. The PHX-Dulles flight delayed a few hours so they rebooked my connection to LGA. Departed Phoenix on a pretty empty plane which was very cool as I had a window seat and row all to myself. Arrived Dulles my connection to LGA would be about two hours late as the plane was arriving late from another location. At that point didnt care just wanted to get home!! Depart Dulles at 10:30 and after a flight over an eerie dark NJ/NY we touched down on Runway 22 at 11:30PM. A very long day but theres no place like home even without power!!!

back in 1997-8 flying LGA-MIA-GCM flt LGA-MIA aborted Take-off at LGA due to what the pilot said was the ground proximity warning going off while we were still on the ground. taxied back to the gate sat on the plane for about 45 min while the problem was repaired then waited about another hour for a slot to take off. miss original connection to GCM but was put on the next one a couple of hours later.

2007 was part of the Jetblue ice storm. On the day of the storm my wife was to fly JFK-MCO early morning for business meetings, didn't end up leaving till 11;30 pm from EWR.

The next day I had a 4:00 flt to MCO with my 2 kids at the time. All day the flight showed on time, as the taxi came I checked one last time and it showed canceled. Called Jetblue as well as every other airline to find a flight from anywhere in the Northeast to anywhere in Fla. final as I was about to get the kids in the car and drive (didn't want them to miss disney) the Jetblue agent said a new flight just popped up on her screen a 10:00 pm to MCO, booked us on it. got to JFK around 6 to be sure place was a zoo. didn't board till almost 1am took off at 3am on a Ryan B757 chartered by Jetblue.

a few week later we all received an email from jetblue and got credits for the cost of the trip ended up using them for a trip to Aruba that May.

Of all the trips that I have taken, only one stands out as being out of sorts. It was back in 1987 flying Continental BDL-EWR-IAH-SAN; SFO-EWR-BDL. It was the first and last legs that killed us, everything else was smooth sailing. On the outbound, our Saab 340 encountered thunderstorms between Hartford and Newark that we diverted around bouncing the whole way in what I can only describe as severe turbulence. The flight ended up taking about 2 hours, or roughly double what it was blocked at.

On the way home, our evening flight on a 727 was delayed until nearly 5 am the next morning by a series of broken aircraft and timed-out crews. At one point we were told that the aircraft leaving for someplace in Florida would be returning with the crew for our flight. Of course the airport more or less shut down for the overnight hours so pretty much the only food available to the crowd of travelers was the loaf of sourdough bread that my parents were bringing back from San Francisco. Of course no hotel rooms or any other form of compensation was offered. Once we arrived in Hartford after what was barely a 15 minute flight, we disembarked to an equally weary-looking crowd hoping to fly to Newark. All night, my father complained that they should have just chartered a bus or 2 and driven us to Hartford. In the time that it took for the airplane to go and fetch the crew in Florida, they could have made a round-trip to Hartford and everybody would have been in the right place hours before the flights ended up getting them there.

Two of my more amusing experiences (looking back on them) happened when I was flying 19 passenger turboprops early in my career.

On the first, I was flying a Jetstream into Seattle. The weather was crappy and we missed the approach and began a divert to Portland, Oregon. As we were climbing out through three or four thousand feet after the missed I was trying to coordinate the diversion, get a clearance for PDX, and take care of all the things that needed to be done. I felt a tap on my shoulder (back then there was no flight attendant so we flew with the cockpit door open) and there was an older German gentleman asking about his connecting flight. I told him I didn't have any information, but he kept asking about how he was going to either get back to Seattle or get to his destination from Portland. I ended up having to get blunt with him and tell him to go sit down and that the gate agent in PDX would have that information. There was nothing I could do about re-booking him. And besides, I had to fly the airplane...

The second was in a Metroliner flying into Midway airport in Chicago. During descent we lost the fuel control unit on the right engine, which basically limits the power to a range between 25% and 75%. Since we couldn't pull the power back to idle, we had to shut the engine down. To add stress to the incident, we had the FAA onboard. We shut it down, declared the emergency, and landed. The amusing part came when we turned to clear the runway and I looked behind us and saw the fire equipment trailing us. The vehicle that was leading the pack was the mobile stairs. I have no idea what they were planning to do, since on the metroliner they could have pulled up to the side of the airplane, walked to the top of the stairs, and taken a healthy step down onto the top of the fuselage. But, by God, they were right there in front!

That was the beginning of a long week that I'm still paying for. We stayed the night in Chicago while they replaced the fuel control unit during a major blizzard. When the weather cleared the next day, we flew back to St. Paul, Minnesota and the captain and I headed for the apartment. Soon after we got back the phone rang and it was my wife telling me they were inducing labor. So I showered, threw some clothes into a suitcase and beat feet to the MSP airport to try to catch a flight to Seattle and then the last flight to Spokane, WA. I got to the hospital about 1am and the darn kid didn't show up for another day and a half. All went well and that baby starts her second year at Texas A&M next month.

Mark (Heeshung) farted in the 206 I was flying and I almost diverted with the owner on board until I realized that the airplane wasn't ACTUALLY on fire.

lost my number 1 jug in my no.2 engine in the DC3 between Norfolk ,and Pontiac,Michigan, one hard days night in January years ago,feathered same then fluttered down to a single engine ILS to near minimums at Clarksburg,W.Va,easing on to that beautiful runway just ahead of the freezing rain, and rime , earning our yearly salary in 20 minutes that early pre dawn morn.

Go-around in LHR on the AA 773 a few months back...and on a C206 after experiencing wake turbulence while landing following a 732 in Kona...stalled and heard the pilot say 'oh s***' several times before he regained control and punched it while I stared out the port window straight down the centerline...hit a tree on landing and tipped over in a hot air balloon. Back when I was afraid of flying watched a screw come out of the wing on DL Express 732 flight and freaked the hell out nearly causing a divert...and delayed a plane once for 30 minutes in ORH when I saw a crack in the overhead and assumed it went through to the skin and...freaked the hell out. Almost got my family kicked off the flight.
I was a good kid.

On my return from Northern Manitoba, landing at YWG I shot this pic of our go around for RWY 36. We lost hydraulics and didn't get green lights after capt. went to drop the gear on short final. He leveled off, flew runway heading while he cranked down the gear by hand. In this shot we are passing over the threshold and you can see a WestJet 73- in line for departure. We were never in any real danger thank god, but as the captain put it "we were just making memories"...

http://oi40.tinypic.com/33w5xy0.jpg

I have two

First one: I was flying from ATL - Detroit - Jfk on a Sunday night after going to a Falcons game. Think this was a few weeks after Sept 11th. A kid about 10 -12 years old was sitting next to me as he was flying alone. I was looking after him like a big brother and of course the flight attendants were giving him everything under the sun. It was a pretty empty flight. A few minutes after takeoff the pilot announced we were making a landing at the nearest airport because of a failure to the backup of the air compression system. I think that is what it was. Well we landed in Knoxville Tennessee and being it was late on a Sunday there was no mechanic on duty. (Thats really what they told us)

They then told us they were sending another plane to pick us up and while we waited for this plane to be fixed or the replacement plane to get there they let us off the plane and told us to get some food or something while we wait an hour or so. I swear they were calling Lowell from the tv show wings to come fix the plane lol

I get to wander the food court but the kid that was with me got to go to the Flight attendants lounge. I spent the hour wishing I was 10 again lol They fixed the plane and we were on our way in about 1 hour and a half.

I don't fly very often so I don't have too many stories. Just about all of my trips have worked out pretty well, without even any significant delays. The only time I had a problem was flying the SFO-JFK redeye on JetBlue. After we pushed back some indicator light (or whatever) apparently came on for one of the engines (as the captain said, "one of those things that if it came on while we were flying we'd keep going, but we can't take off with it on"). We sat there for a bit while they tried a couple of things to try to clear it (running the engines up a couple of times, rebooting the entire plane, etc.) but nothing worked, so we got went back to the gate and mechanical started taking a look.

It ended up not being something they were going to be able to fix that night; we ended up sitting around in a mostly-empty SFO waiting for the last inbound flight from JFK to get in (of course, it was a little late) so that we could take that plane. I think we ended up getting back to JFK about three hours late.

I thought the crew did a pretty good job, all told, though once we were back at the gate it was 'strongly suggested' that we stay on the plane instead of going into the terminal; spending an extra hour and a half sitting in the same seat you're going to spending another 5 hours isn't the most comfortable thing. The most annoying thing was some of the other passengers.

Once back in the 80's when British Airways would ground a flight for the slightest warning light....on a from from LHR to JNB via NBO (Nairobi) - taxi out after the tech stop - engine warning light comes on - taxi back to the terminal. Try to fix it - no luck - put us up in a hotel. Next days - mechanics can't figure it out - fly a spare engine out on the next flight and fit it. Night 2 in the hotel in NBO. Day 3 - engine fitted - we all board - taxi out - warning light - taxi back - can't figure it out - back to the hotel for night 3. Day 4 - can't figure it out - going to send a whole new aircraft on day 5 - night number 4 in the hotel - finally day 5, board new aircraft - continue to JNB. 5 days - 4 nights in a 5 star hotel in Nairobi - on British Airways - different - not exactly what I had planned - but - very luxurious and comfortable!!!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by pgengler

The most annoying thing was some of the other passengers.

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Isn't that almost always the case......................:frown:

1.Yesterday I thought we were going to have a lengthy delay in PHX due to weather in/around Philly. They stopped boarding and announced a 3-hour delay, I sat down with a sandwich, 2 bites later came the 'just kidding' announcement and we boarded. Only an hour or so late. 2.Had a real 3-hour delay @ JFK 2 years ago when a leading-edge flap motor gave up the ghost on our 744, which caused us to miss our connection to Hamburg and lose our hotel room on a weekend they were having this huge Harley convention when most hotels in the city were full. 3.But the worst flight I ever had was in an Eastern DC-9 headed down to MCO. We were being kept in a holding pattern through some real ****e weather and people were throwing up left and right. My head was swimming I was so sick, but I managed to hold on to my lunch. I don't think I've ever been so happy to see Mickey Mouse.

Well, there was that one time our flight got intercepted by fighters...



Oh wait nm.... :cool:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by jerslice

Go-around in LHR on the AA 773 a few months back...and on a C206 after experiencing wake turbulence while landing following a 732 in Kona...stalled and heard the pilot say 'oh s***' several times before he regained control and punched it while I stared out the port window straight down the centerline...hit a tree on landing and tipped over in a hot air balloon. Back when I was afraid of flying watched a screw come out of the wing on DL Express 732 flight and freaked the hell out nearly causing a divert...and delayed a plane once for 30 minutes in ORH when I saw a crack in the overhead and assumed it went through to the skin and...freaked the hell out. Almost got my family kicked off the flight.
I was a good kid.

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Never

Flying

With

Jeremy

That's what I've learned from this thread!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by USAF Pilot 07

Well, there was that one time our flight got intercepted by fighters...

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Nice shot. There was only a small window of time for that picture - after the Fort Smith birds had gone up to Martin, but before they were repainted with MD ANG markings.

There are only two experiences that stand out in my mind. There could have been more, but I can't remember back that far.

The first was a trip I took to Reno. I was on my way home flying USAirways connecting through PHX and PHL. I not for the fact that I was flying First Class, this experience would have been miserable. I had only gotten about 2 hours of sleep the night before flying out of RNO, and I spent the better part of my 4 hour layover in PHX spotting from the roof of the T4 garage. When I boarded the A321 I put my belongings away and got comfortable anxious to depart to I could watch us climb out and then get some sleep. We pushed back and sat in the alley for what seemed like forever. The pilot then came over the PA system and informed us it would be a few minutes due to trying to trouble shoot an issue with the APU. About 10 more minutes had passed and we pull back into the gate. At this point the mechanics come out to work on the plane. We did not leave the plane during this time because in their words "it should only take a few minutes to fix". At this point I should point out that my scheduled connection time in PHL was 2 hours. While the mechs were working on the APU, a customer service rep boarded the plane numerous times to give us updates and let people off that wanted to get off and rebook that would miss their connections. Knowing I had a 2 hour window in PHL, I didn't get nervous until 90 minutes at the gate had gone by. We ended up pushing from the gate 2 minutes shy of the 2 hour rule that would have made the airline unload the plane. I arrived in PHL and was handed a new boarding pass for the next later flight into PVD in case I didn't make my original connection in time. I made it to the gate right as the gate attendant was grabbing for the door to close it. I made it home on time, however, my bags did not.

The second experience I had was on jetBlue. I was flying back to JFK from Las Vegas on the redeye. This was shortly after Sandy had passed through the area. We were enroute to JFK somewhere over the great lakes when the pilot informed us that we were in a holding pattern due to visibility issues at JFK. Due to the impact Sandy had on the area, the ILS system was down and we could not perform a visual landing due to 1/16th mile visibilities at the airport. We flew the holding pattern for about a half hour I think and then the pilot came back and told us that we were going to divert to Rochester. We landed at KROC and pulled up to a gate where we were greeted by the gate attendent. Both her and the pilot told us that we would "sit tight" for a minute to see what was going to happen, since at that point they were getting reports that the fog might lift any minute and we could get back in the air. a little while later, the attendednt told us we could get out of the plane if we wantedto step into the terminal briefly to get a beverage or relieve ourselves, but we had to come right back. I took this opportunity to get out and stretch my legs and grab a coffee in the terminal. I came back to the plane and stood in the aisle for a bit and conversed with the pilot about what was going on. Throughout this whole time, the staff from jetBlue was awesome. After about another 20 mins the crew had informed us that they had reached their timelimit for flying for the day and that they could not go any further if we did not get in the air in the next few minutes. So at this point the entire plane was unloaded and we all went into the terminal while we waited for another crew to arrive from JFK. The new crew arrived about an hour or so later and we were back on our way to JFK.