The good delay
March 26th, 2007 by ktula
If you are a frequent flyer like i am, about one in four flights that you took last year were at least 15 minutes late, were canceled or diverted. Unlike many travelers who were stranded for days at the Denver International Airport around Christmas last year, so far i have been quite fortunate. Most of the delays that affected me were in the order of 30 minutes to at most 3 hours. Even when my flights were canceled, i have always been able to find alternative flights that got me to my destinations within a reasonable amount of time. That said, like most people, i do not like being delayed when i am traveling.
This morning, i experienced another delay that was actually to my benefit. You are probably scratching your head wondering what the hell i am talking about. Unlike most other Monday mornings when i leave town for business trips, when i left my house for the airport, i was a little late. My flight from Seattle to San Francisco had a scheduled departure time of 0745. When i left my house, it was already close to 0625. This particular morning, all the windows of my ride were frosted. Even the inside windshield was fogged up. It took a good 5 minutes before the car was drivable.
“Shit!!!”. That’s what i said 10 minutes later. Somehow in my rush to get out of my house, i left my laptop bag at home! So i had to get back home to pick it up. When i left my house for the second time this morning, it was close to 0640 and it normally takes no less than 20 minutes to get to the airport. By the time i arrived at the airport, it was already 0700. Since i was not traveling on Northwest airlines (i have a Gold elite status but have not yet received my card), i could not use the MVP elite line at the Alaska airlines (a Northwest airlines partner) counters. I could probably get my way around it by using my recently expired Platinum elite card but the long line in front of the MVP counters discouraged me from doing so. After waiting in line for what seemed like eternity in front of the self check-in kiosk, i managed to check myself in. But guess what. The baggage claim ticket printer broke right after i got through with the machine. So while i waited for a service personnel from another kiosk to print me my baggage claim ticket, the lady behind the kiosk with the broken printer had to tell a lot of irate customers to line up behind another kiosk.
By the time i picked up my baggage claim ticket, it was already past 0730. In theory, if i had made a dash for the gate, as unlikely as it was, there was a slight chance that i could make it to my flight. But my flight was departing from the North Satellite, which required a ride on the airport’s satellite transit system. Just before i got on to the train, i noticed that the departure time for my flight had been delayed from 0745 to 0800. By the time i got to the gate, the boarding gate was already closed. Since the plane was still connected to the jetway, i was allowed to board my flight. So what was the cause of the delay that saved my ass? The luggage loading ramp got a little smoky and the smell permeated the plane. It took them about 45 minutes to figure that out.
