new york...or bust

new york, broadway here we come....

Yesterday morning, I flew out of Detroit at 6am. When I arrived in Dulles, my flight had been delayed about 40 minutes or so. I breathed a sigh of relief as I didn't have to race to my gate. I took my time, and was sitting waiting for my flight. Shortly after I got there, it was delayed again until 10:01. No biggie, we had a few hours to spare for when I NEEDED to be in New York. I continued to wait and it was again delayed until 10:45. We boarded our flight and off we went. We got to the runway and had to sit in a long line of planes. The captain informed us that there was some weather issues and we were going to have to wait it out. So, we continued to wait. After about an hour went by, he came back on and told us that all 3 major new york airports were ground stopped due to weather, nobody was flying in or out. We had been cleared for takeoff in DC, but had no place to land.

So, we waited..... and waited.. and waited some more. Finally at 2pm, 3 hours after we left the gate, the captain said that we had been ordered back to our gate. Our flight had been cancelled. I had now missed the entire reason I was heading to NYC, and I just wanted to get home.

They instructed us to head to the customer service area to get a new flight. I stood in line for 2 1\2 hours waiting to talk with someone. When I finally did, all they could do was put me on standby for the flights to Detroit. I waited for the flight at 5:19 and was not able to get on. I decided to go back and stand in line at CSR because they had told me the next flight out to detroit was oversold, so my chances of getting on it were not good, and after that flight, there was nothing until morning. I was hoping maybe I could book myself a flight in the morning to O'hare, and then hop a flight to Detroit. I had resigned myself to sleeping in the airport.

Well, the flight at 5:19 ended up being delayed because Detroit ground stopped flights. Because they had just boarded, the had them deboard to wait it out. I was back in like at customer service when they started reboarding that flight. On a total whim, ran down to see if I could get on. Well, as luck would have it, 4 people didn't reboard the plane. There were 3 of us waiting on standby, and it looked like my luck was turning. Then.... to my dismay, the guy said, oh... I can only take 2 of you, and I was stuck again. There were seats available, but it was the whole weight\baggage issue.The man at the gate was really nice, he actually went and asked the captain if he could take me.... no luck though...

I was disappointed, but decided to ask him if he could check to see where I was on standby for the 10:20 flight. They had told me it was oversold, and at that point I didn't think I had any shot of getting on it. He started looking, and God bless that man, he printed off a boarding pass and said, you're no longer flying standby ma'am. I was so happy, I could have kissed that guy!

We boarded that flight at 10:00, and landed in detroit at midnight.
So...
that was my whirlwind trip to NYC...
or as the case may seem.. the Dulles International Airport.