Misery multiplied: Readers' travel nightmares

Ice delay on a summery day
My mom and I were flying American Airlines from LAX to London Heathrow on Christmas Day 2006. I'd flown that exact flight several times before and flying on Christmas Day would mean less crowds.

About an hour before we would board, an announcement comes over the PA — "The plane is going to be delayed due to ice." Christmas Day in Los Angeles, the air temp outside was 84 degrees. Ice? 

Because it was Christmas Day, no one seemed to know how to get the ice out of the belly of the plane. The flight was not "canceled" but "delayed" until 1 p.m. the next day. Except, now there were two Flight 135s to London Heathrow and no one seems to know about the mysterious "delay."  There was no compensation for the locals. My dad had to come pick us up from LAX and return us the next day...and when you leave Los Angeles at 1 p.m., you arrive in London at 7 a.m. the next day. So a day lost and we really needed to start our holiday running.
— Pam Buck, Aliso Viejo, Calif.

'On-time flight' wasn't even close
I had an American Airline flight with my family the day before Thanksgiving to fly out of Chicago to DFW. There was a lot of snow that day so there were a ton of accidents on the way to the airport and we were stuck in traffic. The trip that normally took two hours took closer to five. While stuck in traffic, we continuously called the airline to see if our flight was delayed.  The lady on the other line repeated told us that our flight was going to continue on schedule. 

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We arrived at the airport 30 minutes before our flight and rushed to get our tickets. Many flights were delayed at that time but we were told that our flight was still on track. Since we had arrived late, we were told that we could not check our luggage so we rushed through security and ran to our terminal dragging our luggage behind. As we were frantically arriving at our terminal, a flight attendant asked us what our rush was, because our plane had not even landed yet. Due to the terrible weather conditions, the plane had been flying in circles waiting for the opportunity to land. ...

We were told our flight was delayed an hour so we waited around.  Then we were told that our flight was going to be delayed until Thanksgiving morning. We arranged our new flight and got a hotel next to O'Hare. Because of the problems we had, my mother found it necessary to call and make sure the airline had everything in order. When she called they claimed we never booked a flight. So we had to rebook.  he next morning we called to check AGAIN and they told us that we would now be leaving from Midway instead of O'hare. So we quickly got ready and went to Midway. When we arrived at Midway they told us that our names were listed for the flight but we had no itinerary. When we asked what that meant, they told us that although were were scheduled for the flight, there were no seats for us. Since we were planning on going to the Bears vs. Cowboys game in Texas that year, we ended up having to split into groups and only half of us made it to the game while the other arrived in Texas later and didn't make it to the game. It was a terrible mess and influenced me to never fly American Airlines again!
— Stephanie Bailey, Chicago

On a cancellation streak
Four of my last five flights have consisted of a cancellation on one of my legs and/or a delay so long that I missed a connecting flight and was forced to sit in the airport for an additional three to five hours.

I generally attempt to fly direct or at odd hours, but at this point its become basically impossible to get anywhere out of New York without some sort of delay. JFK and Laguardia have the direct flights, but are so overbooked with flights and sensitive to problems at other airports, you are almost guaranteed a problem there. Islip is much better in that respect, but you almost always need a connecting flight, so again, the problems at other airports end up trickling down.

My worst was trying to go to Hawaii for a wedding. There was a problem in Atlanta, so my flight from JFK to Salt Lake City was delayed so long I would miss the connecting flight. ... In the end, I couldn't go, as the only ticket they could guarantee was six days later (the day of the wedding) and I wouldn't have arrived in time. Meanwhile, without my ever leaving JFK, they lost my bags, which did end up going to Hawaii and weren't returned to me for four days.
— Jason Miceli, Sayville, N.Y.

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