rlk
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Dec 3, 2007
Police emergency closed the highway. 8 hours to move 17 miles. Ate the cost of our hotel reservation.
That sounds awful.
Police emergency closed the highway. 8 hours to move 17 miles. Ate the cost of our hotel reservation.
Your poor son I hope he has had a few vacations go smoothly for him since then!We've had a few incidents that were not quite disasters.
Great story! I love happy endingsWas a little kid at the time... So no cell phones or means to keep in touch.
As I recall, my dad was supposed to have a conference in Anaheim and then my Mom and I were flying out to meet him and go to Disneyland. At the last minute, Dad's conference was cancelled, so they had to scramble to get him airfare. As a result, there were no seats on our direct flight, so he was going via Kansas City. We get to O'Hare that morning and got all the bags checked on our flight (since our flight was direct and we would be getting in first and could get those and the rental car) and then Mom and I put Dad on the plane to CA via Kansas City. Then she and I killed some time and probably got a bite to eat before boarding our flight.
We were over Nebraska when a man on the flight had a massive heart attack and we had to have an emergency landing (dumping fuel and diving quick for the airport). We get there and they get the person and family off the plane and off to the hospital (believe we did hear he survived). But of course, we dumped all the fuel, so they had to re-fuel the plane and re-stock the food and that all took quite a bit of time.
In the meantime, Dad arrives in Kansas City and his next plane is snowed in in Boston. So he was greatly delayed while they got a plane in (from Memphis or something), so that they could continue on the way.
So the question --- who got to CA first???? That would be my Dad. And by quite a bit. But of course, we have the bags, the rental car information, and all the important information. So my Dad sits there and wonders where on Earth we were since our flight was leaving on time, but not in CA and no one would give him any information. He says to this day that he thought we must have crashed and that he was never seeing Mom or me again. But, we did eventually make it and he was never so relieved in his life.
The rest of the vacation was much better and the rule became we all flew on the same flights moving forward!
Furloughs april 2013
Remember that guy that was snippy with the FA? Well he was close enough to us and he became snippy with the Customs agent! We were next in line for an available agent and the Customs agent says loudly enough "if you want to keep up with your attitude I can just make these people wait even longer behind you"...that sure as heck made him become quiet. So we get that same Customs agent who was quite pleasant to us.
Ugh it was so stressful. Not only thinking we could miss the flight but all the darn bumps in the way with the snippy passenger and the wood vase and the distance we had to go to the gate all the while lugging our carryons and personal item with us.My heart was racing reading your story! WOW!!! I cant imagine the stress!
I don't know either. I mean being snippy to the FA is bad enough but lordy you do not want to be snippy towards the Customs agent. I seriously couldn't believe the passenger was doing that and it could have been at the rest of us's expense.I have never, for the life of me, understood how some people find the nerve (or stupidity) to be rude to customs agents, TSA, flight agents, etc. Do they like being handcuffed and getting cavity searches? I stood in a security line one time behind a guy that blew up at the TSA agent for touching the bag with his computer in it , something along the lines of "Don't you dare touch my computer." This was well after 9/11, computers had to come out of bags and had to for years. He was quickly led away and I have a feeling he and the TSA agents got very well acquainted.
Our worst trip was the time we decided to take youngest SIL to Prince Edward Island. She's a rabid Anne of Green Gables fan and had been begging to go to Canada for years. We took my parents with us as well. Rented an adorable little cabin on the island about 4 hours from the airport we flew into and required a ferry or a toll bridge to get there.
This was before you had to have a passport to go to Canada. We get to the airline counter with our birth certificates in hand and they wouldn't take SIL's, it didn't have a raised seal on it. It was Saturday so there was nothing we could do but call FIL and beg him to come and get her and re-book her flight for the following Monday afternoon. SIL is mildly mentally disabled and had never flown before. She was now going to have to fly and change planes in Chicago by herself. We were also going to have to spend 8 hours driving to and from the airport to pick her up.
The rest of us go on. We decide to take the ferry to the island. I start feeling queasy about halfway across. I'm prone to motion sickness so I figure it will go away once we get off the boat. Nope, pregnant with oldest DS, that was the start of non-stop 24 hr morning sickness for the next 6 months. My mother catches a nasty cold, gives it to DH, once SIL gets there she's sick also. At one point I caught my Dad watching TV with a plastic bag over the remote and a can of Lysol in his hand.
SIL is in a snotty mood the whole trip because her expectations didn't match reality, we get rear-ended in the rental vehicle, my mother took a nasty fall and got all bruised up, lots of little disasters.
PLease keep me posted of all your future travel dates. Ill be sure to avoid those weeks for my own vacations !!!August 2005
August 2017
October 2017
They are pretty major to me. What a nightmarelots of little disasters.
Sorry for your misfortune...but....LOL !!!!!That night, of course our flight was delayed. By the time we got to the hotel it was around 12:30 a.m. There were no airport hotels, so we had to go into downtown Miami. The hotel was down the street from the Four Seasons, Intercontinental and Mandarin Oriental. I had hopes that it was going to be nice. Nope. It was awful. We didn't have our luggage because it was checked. We didn't even have hairbrushes or toothpaste. We slept in our underwear and combed our hair with our fingers. I bought gum to "brush" our teeth at the airport.
When you get to PC, they take your photo with some pretty Dominican women to sell to you on your way home. I told my DH that we were buying that photo because we looked so war torn. The photo still is on display because it comes with such an interesting back story. We lost a day on the island but we have a story to tell.
I would have started my own boxing match with the airline employees. No way I would have the patience for that. Me + tired + cranky = DISASTER! Glad you survived with your sanity intact!I have a travel disaster that I will never forget. It was Oct., 2006. I was a professional boxing judge and was assigned to officiate a world title bout in Tokyo, Japan. I flew on Northwest Airlines from Indianapolis to Detroit and then on to Tokyo. If I remember correctly the non-stop flight was 13 1/2 hours. When we got near Tokyo the plane circled the airport for some time and we were told that we couldn't land because of weather and had to go to another airport. After landing at that airport we were stuck on the tarmac for 6 hours. We were then told we had to spend the night in the terminal. We were given a blanket and small pillow. We had to sleep anyplace we could find. I tried to sleep on the floor, with little luck. We were given a food voucher which was good for some rice and small piece of salmon. We thought we would leave for Tokyo the next morning, but were delayed over and over. We couldn't leave the terminal because of customs and our luggage was still on the plane. After 16 hours we finally left for Tokyo.
I found out the long delay was because the crew couldn't fly until they got their rest and another crew wasn't available. Needless to say, I wasn't in good shape to judge a boxing match but I was lucky because the bout was easy to officiate. As you can imagine we passengers were extremely upset and it was getting ugly. This really tested my sanity.
My only disaster was 2 hours into our 19 hour drive to our first family vacation which happened to be Disneyworld. Had a car on I79 near Morgantown WV riding on my back bumper (imagine that, an entire lane to the left he could have gone around me but chose to drive 3 feet from the back of my car.) Anyways, I see a deer jump over the jersey barrier into the left lane of no traffic and start crossing in front of me. I couldn't slam the brakes on or the car behind would run right through me. I eased on the brakes looking back and forth to the deer coming up and the car behind me. When I saw the car move left I went full brake and at the moment the car stopped, I met the deer and bumped it.
Luckily I assessed the damage and it wasn't much, damage wise. Monetarily was different to the tune of barely any damaging costing $3800. We were able to continue on, but I wouldn't have been too happy if we would have needed towed home and canceled our first family vacation.
Really minor, just brought to meet nd via this thread: five years old, spending the week with my Grandma. First day, we went to the beach. It was all rocky. I cried. Second day, we went to the beach. It was all seaweed. I cried. I sent home that night.
Minor: flying between storms (on the nice day), airline moved several of us to a different, later flight because our first flight wasn't getting there until after the connecting flight left. They swore our luggage was pulled from the bags waiting for the original flight. I got to Las Vegas a few hours later than expected, my suitcase got to New York.
Not minor: at Disney for a(n AOL) meet, so a long time ago, ended up in Celebration HealWe for a week with pneumonia. Positive: the only room available was the Presidential Suite. Less positive: had to get for something to read.
Worst: at Logan, where they have little lights embedded in the road. Pulled my suitcase from the trunk while twisting, my foot stayed where it was, and I ended up on the ground. Hurt too much to move, couldn't stand up even with help. Still insisted I was going. on. my. trip! Nope. The Statie insisted the only place I was going was to the hospital. Mass General, so okay. I'd broken my leg. Again.
Gotta say, both of those trips the airlines, hotels, and Alamo were great.
Oh my goodness! I dont know how you managed! I guess us Moms turn into superheroes when needed.The good thing about travel issues is that they make for interesting stories!
We've had a number of weather related or closed airport delays, etc. Probably the two most interesting/unusual and stressful for me were in 2001.
That February I flew from Detroit to Puerto Vallarta with my just turned 2 and just turned 4 year olds to visit my parents. It was a direct flight in a charter (I think it was mlt vacations). It was just me and the kids.
Flight took off on time. Front door had not sealed properly and the cabin couldn't properly pressurize, so we turned around and landed again. Those of us sitting near the front with ears in a lot of pain.
Sat over an hour for repairs. We're then told to deplane but leave ALL carry ons in place as they only needed 20 minutes to use a sealant and we'd reboard.
Two hours later they let us get our bags (remember I was alone with a toddler and preschooler and the diaper bag was onboard).
At that point it's announced that a new aircraft, and crew, is being flown in. No idea when they will arrive. That we are not to leave this gate area .
We finally left a bit more than six hours past our initially scheduled departure.
Two hours into the flight, we started descending, which I knew was too soon, so that felt odd. Finally we get told to prepare for landing. We're stopping at DFW because an engine has gone out!
At that point it was about midnight. They unloaded us into an otherwise closed section of the airport with most lights off, etc. Flight crew dumped a pile of pillows and blankets on the ground, told us a new crew and plane would come eventually so stay there and left.
About seven the next morning the new plane arrived and got us to Puerto Vallarta with no further incident. Thankfully . I was on DSs last diaper and had long since run out of snacks.
October of the same year, about 4 weeks after the terrorist attacks: our family of four was flying from LAX back home to Detroit. Just as preboarding began, our two year old sat down at the gate and leaned back into the backrest in what turned out to be a broken chair . Chair back broke out from behind him, he fell back and banged his head on the metal support rod underneath.
They kept telling us not to walk out with him past security .Our blood covered shirts might set off an incident . It took 45 minutes for an ambulance to clear security to come get us. 5 staples at ER, and we were cleared to fly, though I was told to wake DS every hour.
The airline had gotten us onto a later, overbooked, flight . Our luggage had gone without us, our shirts were bloody, and the seats were in four different parts of the plane . One couple agreed to switch with me and DS so the two year old with a head injury did not have to sit alone. His four year old big sister, who'd had a rough night too, did end up seated away from us . That kid was a trooper.