How the hell does this happen?

[JimG]

This maybe old news, but this morning on the CBS Morning News, they interviewed a couple who are part of a group trying to get some "passenger bill of rights" passed in Congress after flying on AA and being held on the tarmac in Austin TX (after being diverted for Wx) for 9 hours, supposedly until a gate could be assigned and opened up for them.

So, my question as a bugsmashing general aviation type is....

With passengers experiencing health issues, and starting to riot in the back....

...why couldn't/wouldn't a captain declare an emergency (albeit on the ground) and evacuate the plane there on the tarmac after a certain amount of time?

He/she had to be just as frustrated and upset with the lack of attention from the gate.

Nine hours seems ridiculous and I can understand passengers being upset and even wanting to file lawsuits.

All AA management would do/say is they awarded them about $500 worth of vouchers for future travel, and that "proceedures would be examined and changed in the future".

 

[GuppyWN]

I saw this. Austin, TX. They've got about 4 gates there. I would have waited for an airplane to push back and then just pulled 'er on in. But then I'm a SWA cowboy.

I don't think there's a good enough excuse out there to rationalize 15 hours in a jet from SFO to DFW.

Gup

 

[Huck]

"Ops, this is AA ###. You've got 20 minutes to get us a gate or drag up some stairs. After 20 minutes I'm blowing a slide."

I said this exact same thing on an ATR once - except we didn't blow a slide, we had built-in stairs. Got everybody gathered under the wing, pulled off their carry-ons, then walked them in a line to the nearest terminal door. Left the aircraft parked in between gates with the ass-end hanging out on ramp 3 in ATL. It's called captain's authority, a quaint old concept I learned from my elders in this business.....

 

[F9 Buff]

I don't think there's a good enough excuse out there to rationalize 15 hours in a jet from SFO to DFW.

Said the cowboy from Southwest...

I keeed, I keeed...

 

[skiandsurf]

...why couldn't/wouldn't a captain declare an emergency (albeit on the ground) and evacuate the plane there on the tarmac after a certain amount of time?

2 reasons...

1. Ops probably kept telling the crew, "it'll be just another 15 to 20 minutes".

2.The crew is getting paid by the hour. The crew probably didnt "push" for a gate too hard.

 

[screech]

I dont chime in here too often but I have 3 basic criteria before I ,as a captain, make a decision like this.

#1. Is this going to Kill or seriously injure one of the crew or passengers?
#2 Is this going to cost the company a lot of money?
#3 Is this going to cause a public embarrassment or public relations nightmare?

If you can answer No to all of these questions then I believe that you have made a suitable decision.

Captains know that they must make decisions based on the best information available at the time.

regards.

 

[landlover]

i'm glad and i hope they do get this bill of rights passed. airlining is the worst part of my job and the worst thing going in aviation. service is terrible on ALL airlines. flights get cancelled because they are way under booked, "so let me get this straight, I(the customer) gets screwed and I have to arrive 3 hours late because someone at your company couldn't do there job by selling more tickets"? WTFO. my bags are lost at least 50% of the time. damn i hate airlining. rant off

 

[bravodude]

i'm glad and i hope they do get this bill of rights passed. airlining is the worst part of my job and the worst thing going in aviation. service is terrible on ALL airlines. flights get cancelled because they are way under booked, "so let me get this straight, I(the customer) gets screwed and I have to arrive 3 hours late because someone at your company couldn't do there job by selling more tickets"? WTFO. my bags are lost at least 50% of the time. dang i hate airlining. rant off

FLYING IS NOT A RIGHT IT IS A PRIVILAGE. do you comprendo!!!! If you don't like it DON'T FLY. What do you expect when you won't pay anything over $100 for a seat. Too many people wan't everything for nothing. You wan't service PAY FOR IT, you wan't to be on time PAY FOR IT.

 

[AMRCostUnit]

Another thing...at AA the station mananger's bonus is based on on-time performance of the scheduled departures. A divert (non-sked) on a gate would mess up the schedule, so "no gate for you" until a command decision is made.


Unit
Is FedEx still not hiring active airline guys? Are there exceptions?

 

[Flopgut]

There already is a "bill of rights" for airline passengers. They put it together after the NWA deal in DTW years ago. This sort of thing happens less often now, there are perhaps a few reasons it happens that we can't think of. You can be sure, if they knew they were going to end up in AUS they would not have departed when they did and they would have reticketed every customer they could have out of SFO.

It's a wx problem mostly, that flight won't take 15 hours otherwise. So, just like in DTW, a wx event made gates a limited commodity. Compare that to the energy business and last years' epic storms. All manner of energy became provisional, a limited commodity, AND incredibly expensive! So I would like to know: Where is our energy users "bill of rights"? Or, in the absence of one, why not let airlines extract another $2000 from every customer when we do park!