Well...I'm in Las Vegas, but the trip was not short by any means. I was scheduled to fly out of Columbus on Delta Airlines at 5:15pm on Monday, flying to Atlanta with a 40 minute holdover and then on to Vegas where I was scheduled to land at 9:05pm Western Time. Well, the flight from Columbus was slightly delayed getting in and then they had to inspect one of the tires on the plane. So it wasn't long in to the delay before my name was called to come to the counter. The people at Delta were concerned that the delay would cause me to miss my connection, so they offered to put me on an American Airlines flight leaving at 7:05pm from Columbus and flying through Dallas; scheduled to arrive in Las Vegas at 11:05pm.
So while I'm waiting on the flight to now leave Columbus I stopped and got something to eat. The flight went off without a hitch, and actually got to Dallas about 40 minutes earlier than scheduled. The layover in Dallas was a little longer, so I grabbed a snack and went to the gate. At that point the screen already showed the connecting flight delayed by 25 minutes, that time continued to go up a little at a time...again because the flight was delayed getting there from its original destination. However, the agents at the gate assured all the passengers that as soon as the plane landed, all the passengers deplaned, and the plane was cleaned up, they would begin boarding and get on to Vegas.
So the plane arrived, and de-boarded, and the ticket agent came over the intercom and announced that boarding would be delayed "a few minutes" while they checked out a maintenance issue. After a few minutes the agent came back on the intercom and announced that they had to call in a maintenance crew to fix the maintenance issue and it would be a few minutes longer. The next announcement started with "Don't shoot the messenger" and proceeded to explain that the maintenance issue was "unresolvable" and that they would have to find a new plane and a new gate to pull that plane up to.
After all of that, we finally got on our flight and headed to Vegas. We landed at about 12:20am Vegas time. By the time I was able to get my bag, get my rental car, and get to my hotel, it was nearly 2:00am Vegas time (or 5am Columbus time).
But, I'm here in Vegas. Gonna do some sight seeing for a few days. As a friend told me yesterday, "I'm sure the flight LEAVING will be right on time."
So while I'm waiting on the flight to now leave Columbus I stopped and got something to eat. The flight went off without a hitch, and actually got to Dallas about 40 minutes earlier than scheduled. The layover in Dallas was a little longer, so I grabbed a snack and went to the gate. At that point the screen already showed the connecting flight delayed by 25 minutes, that time continued to go up a little at a time...again because the flight was delayed getting there from its original destination. However, the agents at the gate assured all the passengers that as soon as the plane landed, all the passengers deplaned, and the plane was cleaned up, they would begin boarding and get on to Vegas.
So the plane arrived, and de-boarded, and the ticket agent came over the intercom and announced that boarding would be delayed "a few minutes" while they checked out a maintenance issue. After a few minutes the agent came back on the intercom and announced that they had to call in a maintenance crew to fix the maintenance issue and it would be a few minutes longer. The next announcement started with "Don't shoot the messenger" and proceeded to explain that the maintenance issue was "unresolvable" and that they would have to find a new plane and a new gate to pull that plane up to.
After all of that, we finally got on our flight and headed to Vegas. We landed at about 12:20am Vegas time. By the time I was able to get my bag, get my rental car, and get to my hotel, it was nearly 2:00am Vegas time (or 5am Columbus time).
But, I'm here in Vegas. Gonna do some sight seeing for a few days. As a friend told me yesterday, "I'm sure the flight LEAVING will be right on time."
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