Travel China and Beyond

Air Travel Experiences - Plane Mechanical Troubles and Delays Abound

Over the last three weeks my family and I have had to travel on a number of flights and across several airlines (American, United…) for both business and personal reasons.  Between the Thanksgiving holiday and business travel for me we logged in over 18K miles each and over 6 flights.  During these flights we experienced numerous delays due to plane mechanical issues.  For example - our Thanksgiving trip included travel from Austin (TX) to Huntsville (AL).  That involved 4 flights.  Out of the 4 flights, three had mechanical trouble.  These were all on American airlines.  That resulted in delays from 40minutes to 2 hours per flight.

Then last week I had to fly to San Jose.  I arrived at the airport (for an early morning flight === for an early morning meeting in San Jose) to find out that the night before the 6:40 am flight has been canceled.  Lucky for me I was able to jump on a flight to Dallas and from there to San Jose resulting in only 1 hour delay of arrival.  The alternative was pretty bad — I was going to meet a critical customer meeting!  By flying via Dallas I was able to notify the customer and delay the meeting by one and a half hour — 1 hour flight delay plus time to get to the customer site (my original flight was to arrive early enough that I could make it to the customer’s location way before the meeting time)

Then came my most recent flight Taipei - San Francisco - Austin (just yesterday) —> the flight from San Francisco to Austin got delayed as well (by 1 hour) as the plane had trouble with the navigation system and required parts replacement while the passengers were on-board….That was an United flight.

Have I had only one or two such troubles in a short three week window of time, I would have thought — “This is just a normal / sudden issue”.  But the case here was different — I was on 12 flights in a matter of three weeks and four of the flights had issues with the planes.   Add to that the now usual time delays due to traffic congestion and you have yourself a pretty tough situation for us the travelers.

What is the lesson learned from all this — well, I do not think we can do much to change the readiness of the planes — this is the airlines’ responsibility.  I hope the airlines are taking steps to renew their fleet and / or keep the planes in better shape.  What can we, the travelers do?  One thing only — always plan your trips with the thought that you will be delayed and figure out ahead of time what your options could be.