pet transport part II

[Flying Illini]

For those of you interested, I thought I would describe my recent pet-travel experience.
I will skip the whole story (it's rather boring) and only share the experience on Delta while I was traveling with my pup.
One word. Uneventful.
The flight was from PHX-CVG-IND
Delta charges a $75 fee when traveling with a pet. Other than that, it was a piece of cake. We had a "sherpa" bag (medium) that the puppy traveled in. It fit under the seats with the smallest amount of persuasion (it was about 1/2 too tall). When checking in the counter agent asked to see the paperwork and health certificate on him. They have to verify that he is up to date on shots and that he is older than 8 weeks. Make sure you have this!!
He did get restless on the 3.2 hr leg from PHX-CVG about 40 minutes in so we (my brother and I) put his cage on the seat in between us (we were on a relatively empty MD-88. After that, he settled right down.
Other than that, we had no problems. The dog traveled great (big relief!) and Delta didn't throw any curve-balls at us.
Make sure you travel with a puppy "clean up kit." We didn't have any events but if we did, we were ready. Take water and some food too, our pup was fairly thirsty, probably dried out from the air in the planes as well as some nerves.

If you have any other questions, PM me and I will try to answer them.

JD

 

[jarhead]

Good report! Your experience parallels that of my brother who has transported pets via Delta on three separate occasions. Uneventful.....which is the way we all would like the experience

 

[jetexas]

I remember watching about 50 rampers chasing a boxer (dog) all over the ramp one day at DFW. Definitely 'eventful' pet transportation.

 

[jarhead]

I remember watching about 50 rampers chasing a boxer (dog) all over the ramp one day at DFW. Definitely 'eventful' pet transportation.

Yeah, probably a lot better when you can have the pet as carry on baggage. I have heard of a few bad things when animals are loaded in with the baggage in the belly.

 

[English]

Flying Illini, I'm glad it worked out well for you and the little one.

 

[Metro752]

Where I work we load them in bin 4 (738/75) and then no dry ice can be put in bin 3 or 4. Some of those dogs are really heavy, and their plastic cages will slide down an old wet belt loader.

 

[DaveJ]

When I fly with my dog, she just dives under the pilot's seat at engine start and stays there until we land.

She used to be much better and would sit either in the baggage area or the back seat of my Arrow and just look around. Then one summer, flying up to Oshkosh, I had to penetrate a line of thundershowers and things got a little bumpy, dark, and noisy. At some point, she decided that being under the pilot's seat and not looking outside was a better course of action and dove under there and refused to come out. Ever since that flight, she gets under the seat no matter what the weather.