The Lucky Christmas Dodge

On December 23rd, I went to LAX with my sister for our flights back to DC in time for Christmas. We had to beat feet because part of our Christmas tradition is to celebrate something called "Little Christmas". Our family opens presents on Christmas Eve (24th), but Little Christmas is more or less an authorized event to open one present each, a day early. Barbara's nonstop flight into Washington Dulles from LAX on the newly founded Virgin America would have her into DC sometime mid-afternoon. But given that this was a last minute trip to see Sgt Hawes' Basic Reconnaissance Course graduation, it would have cost me close to $700 to pick up a round trip ticket. Not being made of money, I used frequent flier miles to hook up a United Airlines round trip costing a whopping $7.50. Tough call on that one.. frequent flier miles and $7.50, or $700.. hmm. The catch was that on the return, my flight would take me through Chicago instead of nonstop into DC. At the time of purchase, I couldn't have cared less. At the time of flight, I couldn't have cared more.

When I arrived into LAX on Thursday night, the place was an absolute zoo. That was the first sign that this seasons rush compounded with an already crappy travel year would be a challenge. So when Barbara and I arrived at LAX somewhere in the neighborhood of 08:45, we found that Virgin America and United were conveniently located right next to each other but the airport was already a mad house. Barbara's flight was to depart at 10:40, and mine wasn't heading out until 2pm but given my ambivalence in being laid over in LAX thanks to some of the best people watching in the nation, I was completely fine with that and agreed to get there early with her.

Immediately after getting to the United Checkin line, my stress level started to spike. One woman told me that I couldn't check in until after 10:00, since my flight departure time was over four hours distant. Great. I didn't have any interest in wheeling around two suitcases for another hour so instead I opted onto the standby list to get the bags checked in. This proved to be both a burden and a Godsend down the road. We made our way through security, had some breakfast, and then Barbara went to her gate while I milled around between terminals and gift stores for some last minute Christmas shopping.

At 2, my flight was delayed until 2:30. Looking at all other Chicago-bound flights, they were delayed across the board which definitely raised an eyebrow or two. So at 2:30, we finally received our boarding announcement and jumped onto the plane. To sit. And sit. At 3:00, we were told that United needed our gate, so we would taxi out onto a remote part of the flightline until we received our takeoff approval. Again at 3:30, the pilot came on and informed everyone that the weather in Chicago was so bad that only one runway was operating. As such, we were held in LAX until ORD was ok with us flying in that direction and we were again being pushed back to 4:15. So long, connecting flight. But then at 3:40, a very anxious pilot comes on the intercom and gave us 2 minutes- we received our takeoff green light and if we missed this extremely narrow window, we wouldn't have another one for a whole hour. Flight attendants scrambled, people shut down laptops and tried to get off one last text message before we were airborne.

The flight was extremely quiet, and other than some light chop didn't get sketchy until we were almost into Chicago. Then the clouds rolled up to greet us, the bumps started, and the snow flying by windows was super-thick. The pilot managed a smooth landing and then there we were, at O'Hare. I had received a few updates before we left LAX letting me know that my ORD-DCA flight had been delayed also, so by my watch I had 20 minutes to get from Terminal C to Terminal B and on to that plane before it's now 9:50 departure to Reagan National. I quite literally ran to the first terminal monitor I could find- to read "delayed" or "canceled" on almost every departing flight listed. There were three remaining flights to the DC area that evening and even with the lateness of the hour you could tell that everyone was putting on a last-ditch effort to get people home for the holidays. My flight- the last of the 3, was now listed as departing at 10:55. Guess I can take my time getting to Terminal B, after all. As I made my way, I passed the longest Customer Service line I have ever seen. Passengers were asleep on gate couches. The Red Carpet Room lounge was overflowing. Talk about a worst-case scenario. On December 23rd at the height of the Holiday travel crush, one of United's key mid-country hubs is forced to a slowdown because of weather.

Over the next two hours, I had to change gates 3 times. One of the DC flights was able to get out and one was canceled. The one scheduled to depart O'Hare 2 hours before mine now showed a departure time 5 minutes ahead of ours, now 11:15pm. Then, the gate agent came on and gave us some news.. our crew was stranded in Idaho somewhere. Immediately after that announcement, the Departures monitor showed no scheduled depart time- just "postponed pending airport operations". More and more, it looked like I was going to be sleeping in O'Hare on Little Christmas, picking some random couch seat to call my very own. United EasyUpdate called for the 10th time with an automated update: "Good news! You have been rebooked on Flight XXX departing Chicago O'Hare on 24 December at 9am" I'm screwed.

But then in a rare feat of jointness, the Gate Agent who hadn't left us the entire time came onto the intercom and told passengers that in-fact, United was calling another crew in. The Gate Agent informed us that the DCA flight before ours hadn't departed yet, and depending on how things went in the next half hour we would either have that planeload of passengers merge with ours, or we would all truck down to Gate B-10 and merge with theirs. Then out of the blue, an airplane arrived at our gate and passengers hurried off. A pilot showed up.. and then two. The cleaning crews ran onto the plane and then they disappeared. Several extremely tired looking flight attendants jumped on board. We were told that all we needed was one last flight attendant, and then we were golden. She appeared at 30 minutes past midnight along with a mob of people who had just gotten word down at B-10 that their new plane that would take them to Reagan National was waiting for them at B-16 and had beaten feet to get on line for boarding passes.

We jumped on board and took off at 01:30am, arriving into Reagan National at 3 am. The crew were pleasant and I thanked them profusely for making the effort that they did. With all the canceled flights, and crappy weather they put forth a massive effort given the time of year and desperation of passengers who wanted nothing more than to be with family and friends in time for the holidays. Working in the air industry in this country is a thankless job right now and it's important to recognize those who go the extra mile as much as point out those who don't. But it's amplified time and again when you throw in the tight quarters and high dollar figures associated with air travel. Because of that, I can't express enough how thankful I was to this crew for pressing on at that time of night and under those conditions. Thanks to my name on the standby list in LAX 15 hours earlier, both bags were waiting in the baggage area with no wait- just grab them and go meet Dad and Barbara. "Well, hello! Haven't seen you in a while"

I was extremely lucky and I'm sure the envy of several thousand people who were still stranded in Chicago- and I know it. To drive home the point to me even more, I turned on my phone when I landed and found one voicemail waiting for me- from United EasyUpdate: "Your original flight, scheduled to depart Chicago O'Hare at 9am has been canceled. You have been rebooked on Flight XXX departing Chicago O'Hare on 24 December at 5pm". Lucky dodge. I was in DC in the wee hours of the morning on December 24th but with all the last minute Christmas shopping, present wrapping and other miscellaneous chores that needed to be done before our celebration started, there's no way I would have been able to make Christmas without that crew pressing on like they did.

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