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November 8, 2007
Some people enjoy travelling...
Well, I do too. But last trip was a bit trying. Consider this: on my way to the US, connection in ORD. Only one immigration hall was open for non-US citizens. Result: 1h 15min in line at passport control (with no email access of any kind). With a 90 minute connection, that's stretching it a bit. I think I beat the world record for terminal change at ORD. But I made my flight!!! (My bags didn't, but I didn't expect them to).
On the way back, a different challenge. Two thirds of the way on the MCO-ORD flight, Captain comes on the PA: "flight attendants, prepare for landing". 10 minutes later, smooth landing in... Cincinnati, Ohio (look on the map, it's on the path from Orlando to Chicago). I learned a new airport code: CVG. Discussing with the First Officer, I found out that the cooling system for the navigation instruments had died, and going any further would have fried the instruments. It was a perfect VFR day, but airliners fly IFR... so frying the instruments is a no-no I guess ;-)
Anyway, as a private pilot (and a passenger on this flight!!), I can't blame the flight crew for choosing the safe option. But it took the ground crew at CVG an hour to figure out they couldn't fix the problem, and AA 3 hours to send a replacement aircraft.
Result: missed my connection at ORD (even though this one was a long, comfortable 3 hours one...). I was lucky that AA had a late evening flight to LHR, otherwise I would have been unable to get home the next day, and would have missed my flight for taking the family on vacation. Instead I arrived late afternoon instead of mid morning. Oh, hell, I made it. And flew again the next day, but not for work this time...
Posted by Yves de Montcheuil at 2:45 PM | Comments (0)
