XJT forces 47 PAX to sleep aboard aircraft in Rochester, MN?

[erikgigem]

Colossal failure of leadership - both crew and dispatch. Huge black-eye for both ExpressJet, Continental Airlines, Regionals, and the airline industry. Imagine if your elderly parents or young wife with your baby was on that airplane..

Sometimes flying can get so routine, and crews can get jaded that it leads some crew-members to forget that their are living, breathing humans in the back of the airplane. Moms, parents, wives, babies, grandparents, brothers, sisters, handicapped, UMs. Customer service has to be a priority behind safety for the crew.

 

[fletch717]

Its 100 percent the captains fault. If you are afraid to make a decision then use your cell phone and call someone who can. I can get a senior VP on the phone within an hour. No airline exec would have let that go on had they known about it.

 

[jppt2000]

Ask any Pilot..we've all seen cases where the dispatchers gives us one of those great alternates on the other side of the 300 mile long line of Thunderstorms that has all the great services available but then doesn't let us know on how he was planning for us to get there.

You guys can Monday morning quarterback this crap for another 3 pages, fact is, none of us were there and therefore have no idea what was tried or what went down!

Easy to say stop MM quarterbacking, but 6 hours?
Nope, sorry, this crew failed their pax.

 

[FORESTGUMP]

gutless captain.

 

[SoCentralRain]

Really, the more I think about it, the more it becomes clear that the captain has some serious explaining to do. And what about the F/O? I heard he was a sharp guy. Express Jet can point fingers all they want at RST Airport Authority, the TSA, CO, dispatchers...but those 4 stripes on the captain's shoulders are a lot heavier sometimes. Seems to me she couldn't take the weight of them. Makes all airline crews look like clueless chumps. The whole truth better come out soon.

Even Jetblue with their infamous "jetblooper" on Feb 14 2007 got on the offensive and made things better. Let's hope Express Jet and CO do the same. Take the personal responsibility. That goes for you, too "c"aptain...

SCR

 

[TimsKeeper]

Fbo

Leave the Captain alone, she was just trying to avoid the Signature fees and fuel prices at any and ALL cost!

 

[OUPilot]

so what would have happened if a pass in an exit row opened the exit and people started leaving after say 3 hours?

 

[rumorhasit]

XJT seems to take off no matter what. When SWA is not leaving HOU for DAL but XJT does from IAH DAL then holds for 2 hours with a DVRT to Waco it makes you think. Massive lines of Texas T-storms but good ol XJT takes off. I mean serious do you have Captains or does ops run you? I have seen it over and over here in Texas. So this "incident" does not surprise me.

Continental Pays XJT by completion factor!!!!

 

[rumorhasit]

Most pilots have no idea what happens before or after passengers get in the big tube of recycled air, so by the book and recommendation by SOCC is all they had to go on. I have a guess what the crew and SOCC was hoping and wishing for...a release time for their final destination. The Crew probably had a while before they turned into a pumkin and Dispatch was hoping for a break in the weather. Either way the sit time went way too long, and my question is how did the crew leave roc legal? Did XJT fly another crew to continue the leg? As I recall 6 hrs is not anywhere legal rest, unless its a standup....?

 

[pipejockey]

What time did this diversion take place? It seems as if it were late night. Unless there was a steady state thunderstorm stalled over MSP for quite a while, which is unlikely, how long did they hold before diverted to RST? And how much hold fuel did they have? Late at night there shouldn't have been that many aircraft holding in front them. In addition, I have never encountered a so called "line of thunderstorms" that I couldn't thread my way through.

One of the problems with these RJ kids is that they have only ever flown for the regionals aside from some fair weather flight instructing. And they have never experienced the kind of weather a freight dawg has likely encountered many times over in the middle of night. It never ceases to amaze me how many times, while flying through some areas of weather, ATC asks me how the ride is, or what the flight conditions are at my location, because 90% of everyone else had been diverting. And usually the ride is acceptable! Too many people diverting around friggin clouds! And then our joke of an ATC system gets overburdened with aircraft off route and on headings, then come the holds, edcts, and ground stops! Many people here have suggested growing balls, and I agree! Stay out of the red and yellow and you'll be no worse for wear. Trust me, I'm still alive, and I don't fly through the kind of stuff I did when I was a freight dawg.