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June 25, 2006 Snotboogers
It is so very difficult to keep from rooting for major airline failure. At a minimum, everyone should stay home more because dealing with them on a reasonable level is nigh impossible.
With fuel prices where they are, management has screwed down schedules tightly. The mere possibility of flying on a half empty airplane will soon cease altogether. As a result, when things go array, the traveller gets stuck. There are no options, because with all an airline business has to deal with, who would want to try to compete with them? Seriously. Labor unions, fuel prices, aircraft purchase prices, aircraft maintenance costs, heavy government regulation, labor unions, fuel prices, increasingly frustrated customers at every inconvenience...however minor.... and don't forget the labor unions. The industry is doing its very best to layoff their retirement obligations onto the Federal Government...uh, I believe that is my tax money and that is NOT what I want done with it. What logical thinking, rational human being would want to be in the airline business?
In the last seven days, I have flown about 9,700 miles. There were many legs to my trips. Four flights from four different airports from Steamboat Springs, Colorado to St. Thomas, USVI. Four more flights from those same airports on the return. None were on time. None. Missed connections totalled two. One was a domino from another. The main missed connection was due to the flight crew needing a minimum amount of rest before they had to work again on the morning of my flight. Get ready. Here comes the rant part.
The current union contracts between working flight crews (pilots, navigators, flight attendants, baggage handlers, garbage collectors, vacuum cleaning crews, cooks, busboys, their second cousins, those closer than that and all their pets) requires x number of hours of rest per x number of hours of work. Sure, I'm in favor of public safety. Absolutely I want the pilots well rested and alert. That is why Starbucks was invented and placed on every street corner. Shag it on out of bed and get the hell to work. The rest of us are carrying on just fine on sleep deprivation fortified by caffiene. Truck drivers, bus drivers, heavy equipment operators, moms, dads, students...all have had not enough rest. Have a Dr. Pepper. They are free on your airplane.
The plane from DFW to Denver for me this a.m. arrived in DFW last night very, very late, not that I knew that.
Late on the night before travelling, I checked United Airlines on the computer as to the status of my flight - "on time." It did not say, "All scheduled passengers should sleep in this a.m. because you have not had enough rest. We'll leave later."
The a.m. of travel, I checked United Airlines on the computer as to the status of my flight before leaving for the airport - "on time." It did not say "crew worked very late & will not have to report to work until three hours after your scheduled departure so you should sleep in too."
Upon arrival at the airport at 7:10 a.m. for my 8:30 flight, the curbside skycap looks at his computer screen and says, "You are aware of the delay, aren't you? Oh, you will have to go up to the ticket counters to be rebooked because you will never make your connection in Denver." I looked up from the skycap just in time to see Bunny leaving the airport in her car.
Besides the people in line at the ticket counter from my flight, there were approximately 200 others from a cancelled flight to San Francisco. All were ahead of me in line. All of them. I am guessing five percent of them could speak English and the level of confusion in the line was off the charts. It was 7:10 a.m.
As for my flight, it seems that the plane I was to ride on and the crew that would then be flying me this morning had to avoid thunderstorms in Oklahoma last night. Due to excessive circling, they ended up having to stop in OKC in the middle of the night to refuel before continuing on to DFW. They got in so late that their union contract was empowered. Seems the crew gets to sleep in the next morning, but the passengers must still report because the passenger union doesn't have a clause in its contract requiring that they be told that their plane will be late until they get to the airport and commence standing in line. The passengers have a crappy contract and we need a stronger union.
From the moment I got in line at the ticket counter, the TV screen showed my 8:30 flight would be leaving at 10:15. How did they know that it would leave then? They didn't. They only knew that the crew would not report to the airport until 10 a.m. and 10:15 was the soonest they figured they could wrangle them into working. Wrong. We left DFW at 10:35. No chance. That makes it tough to catch my 11:25 flight to Steamboat from Denver because we will be landing about the time that plane is leaving. Surprise! That plane left ON TIME because I wasn't on it. I took eight flights in five days and the only one that leaves on time is the one that I missed because of the employees' union contract.
A one mile jog through the Denver Airport/City and the smiling ticket agent says, "Oh, we just closed that flight. You will have to step to the service counter to be rebooked." It is back down the concourse you just ran through in order to speak with me. Go now because you are sweating on all our customers who have actual planes to catch, unlike you. I said to her, "let me catch my breath a minute." I am not making this part up. She replied, "It's okay with me if you stand there all day." It sounded just exactly like it reads. Wish I had it on tape. That is the only way anyone would believe it. It is absolutely true.
Catch the next flight you say? After a 40 minute wait in the service center line, that will be leaving Denver at 9:00 a.m. TOMORROW...maybe. But you must standby for the 3:30 flight and the 9:30 p.m. flights which currently show no seats available. None. No, we can't divulge how far down the wait list you are, but if you aren't here to wait for standby, you will not receive a voucher for a hotel, which we will be giving you reluctantly since you are in this spot because our crew was sleeping while you were sprinting to the airport this morning. I am not exaggerating. Maybe you can detect my attitude in what I have written, but this is truly what the service center told me.
Now maybe you were wondering if United Airlines knew that my plane was late from DFW to Denver, knew that we would arrive in Denver nearly 3 hours late because their crew needed their sleep and knew that if they waited just three minutes...THREE MINUTES...that I would have made my connection. Maybe you were thinking that there is no way they could know that and hold it for 3 minutes because that is just asking too much. Well, listen to this. While I was standing in front of the gate counter waiting to see if there was one seat on the little regional turboprop for me on the 3:30 flight, the friendly desk agent kept me apprised of how many more people were due to board the flight to Steamboat for which I was standing-by. Here is a smattering of her jabber directly to me over the last twenty minutes before the Steamboat flight was to take off (notice these comments are in quotes, because THEY ARE QUOTES!!!: "Looks mighty full. I don't think you'll get on this one, Mr. Luck." "Ohhh, that flight from St. Louis might be late. Maybe we will have a seat." "Nope, they just landed. Guess we'll see how fast they can run. Ha, ha, ha." "Six more minutes. Maybe they will make it." "Still haven't seen them. Three more minutes. Wait, there's two of them now." "Only waiting on one more. If he makes it, you won't get on. If he doesn't, you will get on."
This whole deal was entertainment for this woman.
Finally, I said, "So, I have to root for some old guy to trip and fall on his way down here just to get a seat on this plane? Is this what you guys did while the standby people waited to see if I would make it to the earlier flight that I missed by mere minutes because your DFW crew was SLEEPING?" She gave up and gave me a boarding pass, probably so she wouldn't have to look at me anymore.
I deny calling them "snotboogers", at least I don't think I said it out loud. It was almost lunch time and I was, uh, thinking of what to order, maybe a 'big sloppy burger.'
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