It will be a loooooong time before I fly again. I flew yesterday. This is the first time I've ever been on a plane since 9/11. It's also the first time I have ever flown alone. My daughter and I took a road trip to Arkansas. I will post more on this later. Anyway, we took her and her car to Jonesboro, Arkansas. We left on the 19th, and I flew back alone yesterday. Caught an America West plane out of Memphis. When we got to the airport, the clerk told us that the plane was 40 minutes late. Which was nice, since I only had 45 minutes to make my connecting flight in Phoenix. But, she told me that if it did touch down late, I could make another flight at 7:30 that would get me into Los Angeles at 9:00pm, instead of the original 5:44pm. The plane was to take off at 2:25pm. She told us to get to the gate at 2:45pm for boarding. From about 2:30 on, we were looking out at the runway to see the plane touch down. 2:45 passes and still no plane. At 2:51, we walk to the board to see if it was showing whether or not the plane had touched down. It still showed up as being here at 2:45. At about 2:59, the clerk saw me and told me the plane was loading! So, I say goodbye to my daughter and start to go through security. I had to remove my shoes because they had metal lace holders. My very large overstuffed purse went through the viewer. "Excuse me, Ma'am? Would you step over here?" WTF!? Ah shit!!!! I had to go through a more thorough search! And, it turns out that my underwire bra was triggering their fucking wand, so I had to get padded down around my boobs by a female security officer. But, what was worse than that, at least to me? They went through my purse! They went through everything. After several minutes, they were through. I ran to the plane and there were only about 5 people left waiting to get on. I climbed in and went to where my seat was. I had a window seat. I had a window seat next to a man who weighed about 500 pounds, I kid you not. He had the armrest up and was taking up half my seat.
He was a very nice man, but, I really didn't feel that comfortable with him butted up against my thigh the whole flight. He tried to make conversation, but I buried myself in a book so I wouldn't have to talk. The plane landed at 4:20pm, my connecting flight was 4:24pm. I had to go to some sort of Customer Service center at the Phoenix airport. Well, you would think that since about 35% of the people on that flight missed their connecting flights, that there would be several clerks at the desk. When I got there, there was only 1 clerk. The line was about 15 people long. After awhile, another clerk showed up. By that time, the line was probably about 30 people long and spilling out into the main aisle of the airport. I get up to the desk, finally and explain to the girl what happened. She looked over at the girl next to her and said, "The 'Memphis' people are starting to show up!" Then, she pulls out a stack of tickets and told me that my ticket should be there. Guess what!? It wasn't. She had to look me up on the computer. Fortunately, I was booked for the next flight at 7:30pm, so she printed out a ticket. I had 2 hours to kill, but there was no way in hell I was going to leave that terminal and have to go through security again. I walked down to the gate where the plane was going to take off from and started reading again. After about 15 minutes, some restless little brat sitting in some chairs perpindicular to the ones I was sitting in started kicking the last seat in the row I was in. I looked up, looked around and nailed him with a dirty look. Then, I looked at his clueless, inattentive father. The thunking continued. I looked at the brat again, and this time we made eye contact. He stopped kicking. About 30 second later, the kicking starts again. This time, the woman next to me nailed him with a dirty look and also glared at the father who seemed to realize what was going on. The kicking stopped. Finally, their flight was called and they left. Peace and quiet! No, Chatty Cathy on her cell phone sits next to me and starts to yak loudly until our flight was called. And, of course, the woman who is announcing the flight and the group numbers to board the plane is soft spoken. I could barely hear her above Chatty Cathy next to me. I got up and walked over to where the people were queueing up to get on the plane. Finally, my group number was called and I boarded. I was in 7C, an aisle seat. Even better than that? We were in front of the door to the plane! Right behind first class. There were three rows of first class seats, then about 4 rows of coach seats, where I was at. Then, there was the large open space near the door and the rest of the passengers. This was a Boeing 767.
While we were waiting to take off. A member of the ground crew gets on and walks up to talk to the pilot. In all the times I have flown, I have never seen this. He looked so out of place in his greasy work clothes. I was a little worried. I tried to read his face as he walked off to see if he was worried. I looked at the flight attendants, and they didn't seem to look worried or anything, so I wrote it off. Except that, about 5 minutes later, he was back on and walked up to talk to the pilots yet again. What was going on? He walked off yet again. I saw him talk to one of the flight attendants, before he exited and they both laughed after that little conversation. And, she didn't go running off the plane in terror, so I figured that everything must be okay. So, a few minutes later, the plane starts backing away from the gate. There were video screens hanging from the ceiling about every 10 feet. A safety video comes on. As everyone is watching it, suddenly the power goes off! The video disappears, the lights go off, everything. WTF!? A flight attendant comes over the wire, "Don't worry! We have shut off the number 2 engine and will start it again in a second. This is routine with this type of plane" Ummm..... I have flown a 767 before, and I didn't remember anything like this. The engine starts, the electricity comes on, and the plane starts taxiing to the end of the runway. We are now ready to take off. The plane starts accelerating and we are now taking off. Except, that there is this loud fucking hum that starts up on the side of the plane where I, and several other people are sitting. We are sitting on the side where the number 2 engine is. I couldn't describe this sound, except to say that it sounded like a very loud, old, turbo-prop engine. I could hear the regular plane engine sounds faintly, but this was LOUD. The passengers all started to look around at each other, wondering what the hell that sound was. The plane started to level off, and it felt like it deaccelerated slightly. Then, it started shaking. I really thought at that point that there was some serious trouble. I really felt at that point that we might have to go back. And, I thought, that we might not make it. I was terrified. I have never been that terrified. All the other passengers around me looked nervous too. But then, the plane climbed yet again, turned in the direction we were heading and then levelled off. The odd sound grew fainter, but was still there. At 9:09pm, we touched down. And taxied, and taxied and taxied. Past the terminals...... Okay, now I am thinking that they want to isolate the plane for some reason. No, the flight attendant comes over the horn, "It seems that there is no gate available for us right now. We will have to wait until a plane loads and backs away from a gate, before we can go in. It will take no longer than half an hour." A groan goes up from throughout the plane and everyone grabs their cellphones. People who only had minutes to make connecting flights are fucked. Oh, but not all of them.... It seems that some of their connecting flights were also sitting around waiting for gates to become available. An hour later, yes, an hour, a gate finally opens up and we taxi towards it. I left the plane at 10:10pm and ran down to the luggage carousel. The gods were smiling at me. My bag was one of the first ones off. In fact, I was one of the only people from that flight that got their luggage immediately. While the carousel part kept turning with only about a dozen bags on it, the conveyor that was dropping the luggage down stopped. Another groan went up from the passengers. At that point, I really didn't care, I had my bag. As I approached the door to leave the terminal, I had my ticket ready. Why? Because I was warned repeatedly, by printing on the ticket, and signs all over the terminal, that we would be checked to make sure that we had our own luggage before we could leave. Guess what!? There was no one there!!!! I walked right past where there was supposed to be someone posted and walked outside the terminal. I walked to the curb and waited for Mike to pick me up. Vowing, at that time, that I will never get on a plane again.
Posted by Valkyre at June 26, 2004 02:47 PM