Summer 2022 Travel nightmare thread

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Our flight last Friday was cancelled 4 hours before with zero alternatives. We ended up cancelling the tickets altogether and make the 10 hour drive to/from. Not pleasant.

And yes they will 100% seat kids alone. If you and your snowflakes don't want to pay to choose your seats and get spread apart they have a waitlist a mile long once you opt to get off the plane and take another flight. If one exists.

It often has nothing to do with “snowflakes not paying.” If your flight is cancelled and theY rebook you, they rarely have 4-5 seats together, or even two. They’ll spread the kids out all over the plane.

Absolutely. You pay extra to get seats together on the original flight but then that gets canceled, or delayed and you miss your connection. So you get rebooked and the only seats are random middle seats scattered throughout the plane.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:This is an interesting thread.

Traveling by air is certainly difficult right now. It's largely due to the fact that the airlines (primarily because of staffing shortages) have almost no redundancy in place to absorb typical shocks to the system like severe weather.

I don't think the current chaos is entirely the airlines' fault. While I do think they deserve some blame for overscheduling flights and/or announcing new routes without having adequate infrastructure (i.e. planes and people) in place, nobody could have predicted how quickly demand for travel would explode this Spring and how many millions of people decided the pandemic was over and it was time to travel again. I'm sure things will slowly improve over the coming months.

And to all of the entitled complainers out there who are stomping their feet over missing their meetings, vacations, and weddings, etc: Grow up. Read the fine print. Know what you're entitled to and what you're not entitled to when you book a flight. The FAA makes that quite easy to review.

https://www.transportation.gov/airconsumer/fly-rights#Delayed-and-Cancelled-Flights

Do you work for an airline? Given current prices of airfare, it's difficult to imagine calling someone "entitled" who pays $$$ and then misses a wedding due to airline mismanagement.

Prices are actually more reflective of actual value now. Airline prices have been exceedingly low for ages. Yes entitled is totally applicable. Spoiled would apply as well.

[Anonymous]

This thread makes me nervous. My 16 yo is going with her camp to Israel next week. Hopefully everything will go smoothly with their direct flight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:This thread makes me nervous. My 16 yo is going with her camp to Israel next week. Hopefully everything will go smoothly with their direct flight.

International nonstops are most likely to be fine since they are priority. It’s the connections to and from those international fights that seem to be getting messed up and ruining peoples plans.

[Anonymous]

My weds am flight to dc was cancelled last night. Wonder why it would be cancelled days in advance? Crew shortage?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My weds am flight to dc was cancelled last night. Wonder why it would be cancelled days in advance? Crew shortage?

Yes that's the most likely reason.

[Anonymous]

It’s a complete sh1t show these days. I’ve flown a lot in the past year and this is the worst it’s been. So many people traveling and staff shortages.

We were supposed to fly out yesterday but our first flight was delayed making us miss our connection and the other connecting flights that day were full. We were notified the night before so I was able to rebook online before we even headed to the airport. Good thing because our connecting flight was then canceled. Today we were on the plane ready to go and had to deplane for the plane to have another security scan. It was the first flight of the day and plane arrived last night. Security scan was done but apparently someone was on the plane after than so we had to deplane and have the plane rescanned. We were flying between 2 major hubs. Most people on the plane missed their connections. Luckily ours was delayed so we were fine but it was a huge clusterf@ck. Airlines are a mess these days.

[Anonymous]

My recent flight from Dulles took off 4 hours late (with us sitting on the plane all that time). They kept having to repair the plane/ replace parts. This was before we flew across the ocean. It was very unsettling.

[Anonymous]

Missed our connection to Lufthansa flight to Dulles in Munich yesterday due to delays on both ends of our first leg, including sitting on the ground for an hour prior to deplaning because of (they said) ground crew shortages. Got rebooked on a United nonstop the next day thanks to making it through on the Premier customer service line, but there were at least several hundred people in line for the Lufthansa service counters. A lot of them ended up sleeping at the airport. We got a hotel and made it back today, but so far without our luggage.

No trouble on the outbound leg two weeks ago, but the summer tourist season seemed to really kick off while we were over there.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Missed our connection to Lufthansa flight to Dulles in Munich yesterday due to delays on both ends of our first leg, including sitting on the ground for an hour prior to deplaning because of (they said) ground crew shortages. Got rebooked on a United nonstop the next day thanks to making it through on the Premier customer service line, but there were at least several hundred people in line for the Lufthansa service counters. A lot of them ended up sleeping at the airport. We got a hotel and made it back today, but so far without our luggage.

No trouble on the outbound leg two weeks ago, but the summer tourist season seemed to really kick off while we were over there.

Wow!!!!

Us almost as well.

Had flight to Munich on Lufthansa as well connecting to Dulles (7:40pm arrival) as well.

We made it but barely. Lufthansa flight landed 1 hr late, took off 1 hr later. Crew said staff shortages in Munich and airlines caused delay. When we landed in Munich, 10 of us ran like crazy through airport to catch Dulles flight! We made it only since it was delayed due to rain!!! We landed at 4pm and flight was to take off at 4:30….


Many people on plane had flight cancelled. I think about 1/2 the Lufthansa flights were canceled from Munich yesterday! People were pissed..it sucks everyhwere.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Missed our connection to Lufthansa flight to Dulles in Munich yesterday due to delays on both ends of our first leg, including sitting on the ground for an hour prior to deplaning because of (they said) ground crew shortages. Got rebooked on a United nonstop the next day thanks to making it through on the Premier customer service line, but there were at least several hundred people in line for the Lufthansa service counters. A lot of them ended up sleeping at the airport. We got a hotel and made it back today, but so far without our luggage.

No trouble on the outbound leg two weeks ago, but the summer tourist season seemed to really kick off while we were over there.

Wow!!!!

Us almost as well.

Had flight to Munich on Lufthansa as well connecting to Dulles (7:40pm arrival) as well.

We made it but barely. Lufthansa flight landed 1 hr late, took off 1 hr later. Crew said staff shortages in Munich and airlines caused delay. When we landed in Munich, 10 of us ran like crazy through airport to catch Dulles flight! We made it only since it was delayed due to rain!!! We landed at 4pm and flight was to take off at 4:30….


Many people on plane had flight cancelled. I think about 1/2 the Lufthansa flights were canceled from Munich yesterday! People were pissed..it sucks everyhwere.

Even though we made it to Dulles, they lost the luggage as well as 1/2 the plane.

Line for the lost luggage counter was 40-50 people deep. Basically they only delivered half the luggage, WTF.

But grateful to have made the flight.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Missed our connection to Lufthansa flight to Dulles in Munich yesterday due to delays on both ends of our first leg, including sitting on the ground for an hour prior to deplaning because of (they said) ground crew shortages. Got rebooked on a United nonstop the next day thanks to making it through on the Premier customer service line, but there were at least several hundred people in line for the Lufthansa service counters. A lot of them ended up sleeping at the airport. We got a hotel and made it back today, but so far without our luggage.

No trouble on the outbound leg two weeks ago, but the summer tourist season seemed to really kick off while we were over there.

We flew from Catania to Munich. Where was your flight from?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We flew from Catania to Munich. Where was your flight from?

Elsewhere in Italy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Happened to me but just a work trip. How can airlines not be held responsible for ruining so many peoples’ plans? How can the OP not be entitled to some compensation above a refund?

Because America loves capitalism and capitalism means big companies can do whatever they want.

You obviously hadn’t experienced Eastern Europe in or around the communist era. 2010s wasn’t much better IMO.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My recent flight from Dulles took off 4 hours late (with us sitting on the plane all that time). They kept having to repair the plane/ replace parts. This was before we flew across the ocean. It was very unsettling.

Wow. You guys were sitting at the gate for 4 hours!!! Was this an int'l flight or domestic?