My flight was scheduled to leave Kansas City, MO at 11:47am central standard time on Friday, December 19th via US Airways so I made sure to get up early so that Lauren (my brother’s girlfriend) and I could make the 45 minute drive to the airport. Upon arrival with my itinerary in hand, I was directed to the United Airlines check in counter and checked in for my flight – apparently, I wasn’t flying US Airways after all. Lauren left me to proceed through the security check point, neither of us knowing the problems I was about to be faced with. My flight didn’t leave for another 30 minutes or so when I realized I didn’t have a seat assignment on my ticket; I went over to the United counter in front of the gate my flight was suppose to leave from and was rudely told that I had to wait for my name to be called…I didn’t think anything of it at that point.

30 minutes pass and people start to board the aircraft while I’m patiently waiting wondering when I was going to get to board. Boarding was complete about 15 minutes later and I still hadn’t boarded the flight and was rudely informed that the flight had been overbooked and that I was on stand by and no seats were available. I immediately felt my face get hot and tears well up in my eyes – I was stuck once again in the airport on the same damn airline that got me stranded in Dulles last year OVER NIGHT! I called my mom and my grand mother to explain to them what was going on, both of them livid…the lady at the counter overheard me and prompted me to go to the other counter so that I could rebook my flight and that she would meet me over there when she was done.

The lady proceeded to check flight after flight to no available. Everything was booked. No seats were available on any flights to Charleston, SC. I was suppose to fly from Kansas City, to Washington Dulles have a 2 hour layover, fly into Charlotte, NC layover for 40 minutes and fly into Charleston…NOTHING was available. All I wanted was to go home for Christmas, all I wanted was to be with my family. I called my grandmother and asked her how far Atlanta, Savannah and Myrtle Beach were from Charleston thinking that if I could at least fly into somewhere close someone could drive and pick me up. After searching for a bit the lady found a flight that would take me to Chicago and then into Savannah – she booked me and I had confirmed seats. She also informed me that there was a flight leaving from Chicago going to Charleston and that if I wanted to get put on standby when I arrived there, I could and hopefully get a seat on that flight. I did just that while waiting 3-4 hours in the airport.

When the time came, I didn’t get a seat on the Charleston flight but I had a confirmed seat on the Savannah flight so no worries. But when it came time to board for Savannah, we ended up waiting another hour because the aircraft hadn’t shown up and they had three different flights leaving out of one gate…in the end, I made it on the flight and safely to Savannah, GA at 12am in the morning. My grandmother, grandfather and cousin picked me up and we made it back home at 3am in Charleston. I had a good week at my families for Christmas despite the drama that always seems to linger in the air but by the time the 29th came, I was ready to go home – not only did I miss my stuff and my own space, I was looking forward to picking up Alan. I arrived home at 12:30pm on the 29th and picked him up at 10:30pm that night, I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Moral of the story: if you want to make it to your destination on time, don’t fly the week before Christmas in the dead of winter when everything is snowed in…and never, ever ever ever, fly United Airlines.

This entry was posted on Saturday, January 3rd, 2009 at 3:54 am and is filed under Travel. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.