Winging It

The answer is very simple,, just let comgress pass a bill outlawing inclement weather...Thunderstorms pay a fine of $ 1,000,000.00 and all other weather that affects airline flights will be fined $ 500,000.00,,, See, I said it was simple
YHS

The Black Friday air travel imbroglio gave me the opportunity to lean back and reminisce a bit about how travel used to be- in my mind, at least.

I remember the days of riding the train with my parents. There was always the rushing to the station a little early to be sure that we didn't miss the train. "The train leaves at four oh-six, not a minute earlier, not a minute later.", my father would announce in his matter of fact voice as he threaded our DeSoto around the parking lot searching for the ideal parking space. Not a minute earlier, not a minute later. And, at four-of-five, the oscillating headlights of the EMD E7 engine would come into view accompanied by the staccato of a few prideful horn blasts making the arrival official. We grabbed onto the cold, shiny handrails, pulled ourselves up the steps and at exactly four-oh-six, we were watching our town slipping away from view.

As a child I imagined the railroad industry to be a giant timepiece entrusted with maintaining our sense of social order. This must have been true as life seemed to be punctuated by the movements of the railroads. Uncle Pete knew that when he heard the rumble of old 67 entering the head of the valley, there would be exactly five minutes to hustle the raw milk cans down to the Austin Meadow siding. Uncle Pete would help Whitey, the brakeman, hoist the four or five dented metal cans onto the boxcar then bid each other adieu by wiping their brows with their red bandana kerchiefs. I am sure that when the engineer reached over and gave two whistle blasts indicating departure, old men sitting on porches and hunkered over checkerboards around the valley reached for their pocket watches, smiled and nodded in satisfaction. Not a minute earlier, not a minute later.

Airline travel doesn't seem to impart a sense of social order that we experienced with the railroads. As a nation, we could point proudly to statistics as to how many miles of track we maintained and how many passengers could be safely delivered to their destination, on time. We respected our railroad system and afforded it's employees a level of respect for their individual contributions to our travels. But, we seem to have lost our respect for the airline industry and it's employees. Many of us find it difficult to step outside of an adversarial state of mind when we check in or board a plane and I would imagine that airline employees sense this and reflect it back to us in kind.

Unlike the railroads which benefited from owning and controlling their infrastructures and, subsequently, their destiny, airlines are in constant negotiation with those who own the airport; those who supply the baggage handling services; those who regulate safety; those who regulate competition; those in the public who expect 100% safe travel; weather problems, and the countless vagaries that come with managing hundreds of speeding missiles simultaneously lobbing through the air. I am amazed that any flight can depart and arrive at it's destination.

Do we need to create legislation or manifestos to insure that air travelers are not left in the taxiway for hours on end? Probably, yes. But I would hope to defer doing so until we can better understand who is responsible for these taxiway debacles. Are there airport ground control rules which will not accommodate a flight returning to the gate once dispatched? Are airlines levied a penalty for waving off from a takeoff? Is the federal air control system capable of supporting flights which are many hours out of rotation? We just don't have answers to these questions at present and I think we need those answers.

Still, being left on the taxiway without water or food does little to reduce the adversarial relationship between the passenger and the airline and we need to address this shortcoming. Surely, there is a way to help the airlines maintain and increase our sense of social order. I think that once we have a better understanding of the issues facing them, we will make a timely arrival at a common place where we can smile and nod in satisfaction. Not a minute earlier, not a minute later.

I experienced an American cancelled flight coming home from San Jose, CA, via Dallas. The flight from Dallas to PHL was delayed an hour and a half but we still boarded and taxied out to the runway. At that point, they calculated that, with the flight time, the crew would exceed their 16 hour limit. So we turned around and came back to the gate at 10:45pm.

The nice thing was that American put everybody up at a very nice resort overnight.

The stories of hours sitting on the tarmac are horrible and hopefully, airlines and the FAA would try to make a determination sooner rather than later for whether a flight is actually going out or not. It is a no-win for the airlines who cannot control the weather in the skies that they fly in.