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Almost missed a flight

  • 19-01-2013 7:19pm
    #1
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 10,431 ✭✭✭✭


    The wife was scheduled to leave for Bali tonight, with me following next week. Flights to Asia are usually oversold, so if you show up late you wont get on regardless of holding a confirmed reservation, I therefore decided to be smart this time and checked her in around 9 hours before the “departure” time, then I went home and relaxed, panic over, or so I thought ☺
    Flight Attendant friend was sitting having coffee with the wife and at the same time she was slowly getting packed. Friend started asking about when they changed the departure time for the Jakarta flight, she is based in Jakarta and as far as she knew, the departure was 2120 hrs and not 2320 hrs as we had told her. Don’t panic, husband is always right, he is never late for a flight. Once I started hearing this, I started to panic, I didn’t have a ticket as its an e-ticket so all that I needed was the SMS confirmation number… I started checking online for the departure time, I was sure that it was 2320….. Oooopppsssss, nope I was wrong, it was 2120 or 1 hr 20 mins time from when I discovered this. Oh C5AP.

    Within 5 minutes we are racing out of the house towards the airport and I’m trying to think of the best route for this time of the night, I decided to go for the most direct route and hoped that the traffic cooperated, its funny that when you are rushing like this, every single traffic light turns red. humbug. An hour before departure we are stuck in traffic caused by the construction of a new flyover into the airport. humbug again, I knew that I should have gone the long way ☺ Next delay is the military checkpoint on the airport road, then we rush into the car park, some guy pulled out of a space and I somehow managed to squeeze my truck into the spot… I really hoped that I would get back before the two drivers beside me ! Then we ran, across the car park, into arrivals, up the escalator and right up to check-in, no lines or queues anywhere, this is wonderful, thought I. Wife handed over her boarding pass, guy smiles, checks the system and says “Flight Closed”… We had already expected this, and planned that she would leave anyway and I would get someone to take the suitcase tomorrow…. But then without asking, the guy shouts down to someone at another desk, who calls someone else on a radio and got the flight reopened. This happened to be the same guy who had accepted her ticket from me, so he just looked at me and laughed, then told her to enjoy her flight…. She ran towards immigration and security, laughing all the way.
    Drama over, I head back home…… I can’t blame her this time. But sometimes it’s nice to deal with non lo-cost airlines.

    So what about you guys, what’s the closest that you have come to missing your flight because of your own stupidity?


    smurfjed


Comments

  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 71,184 ✭✭✭✭L1011


    I've actually missed one flight, I was refused access to the security area with a boarding pass in LBA despite knowing that the flight was delayed (from someone else on it). Didn't argue the case as if it'd taken ten minutes to argue my way in, it would likely have definitely closed by then. Didn't wake up for my alarm and the hotel never buzzed up to let me know the taxi they'd ordered for me was there - was packed and would have been down in 5 mins max, but still my own fault for missing the alarm.

    I've also nearly missed a flight in Gatwick for having got the times for the two sides partially mixed up - the minutes basically - so thought I had half an hour more. But luckily it was a sub-24hr return trip so I'd been given my boarding pass in Dublin for the way back. Got through in time, easily could have missed it with checking in in the airport.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,930 ✭✭✭galwayjohn89


    I've missed loads of connections.

    Only 'first' flight I missed was in Edinburgh or Glasgow can't remember which. Arrived at the airport plenty of time. Went sat at the gate, dozed off, woke up to see the plane being pushed back.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 7,472 ✭✭✭highlydebased


    Was convinced I was flying home for xmas on 21st December last year (because we left Ireland on 21st September), though in actual fact we were meant to fly on 20th December! Taxi and all booked for the wrong day.

    Happened to notice the flight details which was printed out and left on the coffee table at about 11.30pm the night before the flight. Never got such a fright. Would have gotten over missing the flight but what I was most scared of was what the other half would have said if we rocked up to the airport on the wrong day...


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3 siliconjoe


    MAD 2+ years ago,evening flight back to UK.Acually boarding and Captain came up the airbridge "Sorry,A.T.C in UK gone down approx 3 hrs delay,but dont leave the gate area," -fair enough.I and two friends decided that the 15 mins walk to the end of Terminal1,where a Cuban IL 96 and 2 Pullmanter 747s where parked up was worth it,got the reg's got back to gate,flight gone,bag off-loaded,-own fault.Got re-booked into BHX (only flight available)as opposed to BRI for the following day.Next morning ,boarded hotel shuttle NO hand luggage inside bus,all to be in boot.Arrived at airport,main case there,but hand case with binoculars(2)cameras(2) log book and passport gone. MORAL -do as requested by the ones who count!!.:o


  • Hosted Moderators Posts: 3,807 ✭✭✭castie


    Flying to London to watch Toulouse vs Wasps Hcup final. (Dam you Leinster and Munster!)

    Arrived at Cork airport 1 hour before flight.
    Flight was delayed and just before going through security (would of been boarding time without delay) I realised I forgot the match tickets and had to do a 40 min round trip in a taxi to collect them!


    Delay saved me massively!


    Missed a Singapore Airlines flight one day by a whole 24 hours!
    Timing just after midnight (00:45) and stupidly forgot the date change!
    So booked flight for a Wednesday and showed up 23:00 on Wednesday expecting the Thursday flight but luckily they changed it for me at no charge.


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,130 ✭✭✭mel.b


    I've never missed a flight but come close a couple of times...

    1. Flying out of SNN with EI, made closing time at desk by a minute. Can't remember why i was running late.

    2. Flying out of LHR with TK on an early morning flight. Had a new mobile phone and thought i had set the alarm to wake me up. Head off to sleep and next thing is a phone call from the front desk...my taxi was waiting to take me to the airport...WTF! Alarm didn't go off and i was just so thankful i had booked a cab rather than getting the heathrow hopper.

    3. Flying out of BRU with SN. We were catching the train from Bruges to the airport and had given ourselves ample time. On the way, some poor soul threw himself under our train :( train was delayed for around 2hrs and we had missed check in at the airport. Fortunatley we weren't the only ones as the whole rail network was disrupted and SN let us check in late. I think we made it to the gate less than 10min before dept.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,708 ✭✭✭BeardySi


    Missed a FR flight from LGW to DUB after I forgot my passport - I was leaving for the airport from work and couldn't make the 2 hour train ride home and back in time for the flight! :( (bloody Ryanair ID rules). Expensive mistake, had to rebook for the next day...

    Missed an EIN flight from LHR to DUB because someone decided that jumping on front of a picadilly line train was a good thing to do... No problem getting on the next available flight out and no charge either.

    Not quite a miss but I once booked a trip in the wrong direction - DUB-LCY-DUB instead of the other way round. Didn't realise till the morning of the flight. It was cheaper to get new flights with EIN from LHR than change the tickets with Cityjet ( :( cos I've always loved LCY, it's a great wee airport!).


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,930 ✭✭✭galwayjohn89


    Treadhead wrote: »

    Not quite a miss but I once booked a trip in the wrong direction - DUB-LCY-DUB instead of the other way round. Didn't realise till the morning of the flight. It was cheaper to get new flights with EIN from LHR than change the tickets with Cityjet ( :( cos I've always loved LCY, it's a great wee airport!).

    Its worrying the amount of times I have done that!


  • Banned (with Prison Access) Posts: 7,102 ✭✭✭Stinicker


    I have thankfully never missed a flight but have had several close calls and one funny stupid incident.

    Firstly the funny incident!

    Once in Cork airport I was flying out to Prague and I rather stupidly put my watch forward +1hr to CET time, I then managed to get on a Aer Lingus plane bound for Heathrow which was docked at the same gate as where the Prague flight which was 1hr later, I was early for the flgiht. The cabin crew were making the announcements of welcome onboard to this flight to London Heathrow! :confused:, I immediately told the Cabin Crew that I was flying to Prague and not Heathrow and I got disembarked and then I realized how my watch had tricked me by putting it forward the hour.

    That same year I had the most narrowest of escapes ever in Newark with a Continental flight as it had been pouring rain for like two days there and my relations were driving me from Queens to Newark and the Holland tunnel got flooded which resulted in a long rush hour diversion up through Manhatten to take the Lincoln tunnel instead. Luckily I had checked in online and arrived in Newark 35mins before the flight and made a mad dash for it, dropped the bags and through security as the were paging me for the flight. Then the compound the misery the plane went technical at Newark for 3hrs before we got airborne and when I arrived in Shannon the following morning my bags had stayed behind due to the tight timing. Continental couriered them to me then the following day! That was tight!

    In 2011, I was flying to Bangkok and was booked on Etihad from Heathrow with Aer Lingus separately from Cork, I gave myself a whopping 9 hours between flights and still managed to almost miss the Heathrow leg. having a massive amount of time to kill, I left my bags at left luggage and stupidly took the London Underground normal service into the city and it took me 2 and a half hours, rule of thumb never underestimate the size of London and always take the more expensive Heathrow express train. After spending a while with my relations there and allowing for the massive long train journey back that when I got back to Heathrow and retrieved my bags the checkin was just closing, i literally came running across the checkin area and was like hold it hold it hold it, I'm here! The lad at checkin started laughing and said its ok your here now and checked me in, was dead sound and was from Ireland and even knew some people from my town, Checkin closed had just come up on the screen. Another narrow escape.

    In 2011 at the end of the same trip I arrived in Bangkok Suvarnabhumi 2.5hrs before departure and then had to queue for ages to go through outbound immigration and security, in the finish the Etihad checkin clerks called us all and gave us VIP security passes to get through quickly and we then had to run to the flight! I then got an attack of asthma and was in a seriously bad mood as I had just lost my phone when I got to the airport as I had gotten a text, replied to it and left the phone in the back seat of the taxi, never saw it again! I was in grump all the ways home! I also had money stolen a few days later and I cursed Thailand that I'd never return, but I did last year and had similar airport problems!

    In 2012 having returned to Thailandmy flight from Bangkok to Dubai was delayed by 1.5hrs and I then got delayed by another hour to clear security in Dubai and luckiloy Emirates held the flight or I'd have missed it, there was good handful of passengers in a similar situation but it was just another mad rush through an airport again, very stressful and I had no time to load up on Duty free either.


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,294 ✭✭✭YellowFeather


    Yep, I've missed a plane or two in my time!

    By far the worst was a trip to New York flying Dublin to Heathrow to NY. Due to pure stupidity, we were running late anyway, and then decided to park in the long term car park in Dublin not realising that we had to get a shuttle bus to the airport! By the time we actually arrived, the plane was already gone and we had to be put on standby for the next London flight.

    A few hours later, we got a flight to Gatwick (which, obviously, we had to pay for). We could have made the NY flight, but, unfortunately, it was flying from Heathrow; not Gatwick. Being the eternal optimists that we were, we decided to get a taxi to Heathrow in the hopes that the flight was delayed. I'll never forget the panic! Of course, the plane wasn't delayed at all, and we arrived in Heathrow to miss plane number 2. Back on standby and another rake of money to buy another set of tickets! Ended up in Heathrow for over twelve hours waiting to get on another flight.

    Ended up being an amazing holiday when we finally got there, but I can never remember it without thinking back to the fear, the taste of fifteen million coffees, and being awake in the end for something like 38 hours from getting up for work on the morning of the flights to getting to our hotel in NY much later than planned! And I don't even like to think of all the extra money we had to pay. But at that stage, we just had to get there!

    (I won't tell you about how we almost missed our flight back after we couldn't find the street where we'd left our luggage in on the last day...:p)


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  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 25,624 ✭✭✭✭coylemj


    Missed one flight and boarded the wrong plane on another occasion..

    1. Missed flight

    EI decided to get tough on latecomers, it was probably when FR started crowing about being the most punctual airline out of Dublin. I was flying on business to LHR and arrived at the check-in desk (this is in the 1990s) about 20 minutes before the flight. The two EI desks were empty, the ladies at the desk next door told me that had just vacated the desks a few minutes earlier. Went over to the EI desk and asked if I could be allowed through, I had a laptop bag and nothing else. He called the gate, said he had a 'runner' and could he give me a boarding card, they said 'no'. I called a colleague who was on the same flight, he said they were at the gate but hadn't started boarding. I said this to the guy at the desk but he said he couldn't do anything for me. He swapped my booking for the next flight so I was off about an hour later, no big deal.

    One or two weeks later I was on another EI flight to LHR and guess what? The word had gotten around so the flight was full and doors closed a full five minutes before the scheduled departure!

    2. Wrong plane

    Was in Newark in 1986, was flying to Dulles so I joined a queue down a jetway for my flight. For some reason I suspected I might be in the wrong queue so I asked a guy beside me if this plane was heading to 'Dulles', he gave me a strange look but said 'yes'. I boarded the plane and although I was allocated seat 4D, I found that the first three rows were large pullman seats and they were numbered 1, 3 and 5, obviously business class but no 4D. I asked the stewardess to sort me out whereupon she announced that this plane was flying to DALLAS, clearly my Irish accent threw the guy in the queue. The queues for the flights to Dulles and Dallas went down the same jetway but then split left and right, I went the wrong way!

    I disembarked but had missed my flight but at the desk they sorted me and put me on the next flight so again, no big deal. To this day I always listen when the cabin crew announce 'welcome to flight EIxxx to London Heathrow' to make sure I'm on the right plane and I always flash the boarding card at the staff when boarding even if they don't seem to care.


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 1,657 ✭✭✭brandon_flowers


    Have yet to miss a flight but have missed several connections and have had several close calls with flights and connections.

    The closest was probably dropping my brother to a 06:30 flight in Farranfore a good few years ago. Being Ryanair there was a good chance he wouldn't make it but we gave it a shot anyway. Dropped him at the door and as I pulled away towards the exit I could see him sprinting across the tarmac at the other side of the terminal. The garda on duty at security gave him a free run straight to the gate, lady tore the strip from his boarding card and out he went. Up the steps, door closed behind him immediately. So from me dropping him at the door to running up the steps took about 45 seconds. The time was 06:31.

    Only in Farranfore.

    I just laughed and drove home...


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 19,050 ✭✭✭✭murphaph


    I've never missed a flight, but I have done the opposite.

    A group of us were in Burlington, Vermont for work and we checked out of our hotel and headed to the airport to catch the flight to BOS and on to DUB.

    Got to the check in desk in Burlington to be asked "have you changed your onward connection at Boston?"...ummm, "no, why?" .... flight was for the next day.

    We thought, hey no problem, just call up the hotel and check back in right? No chance...there was some bloody festival on that weekend and there were NO ROOMS anywhere (our company had a travel desk and they called all around for us). We ended up flying to BOS and overnighting there in some crappy Howard Johnson hotel (the normal hotels were all booked up in Boston as well) in Cambridge, MA. We got home eventually though :-)


  • Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 2,258 ✭✭✭deandean


    Car wouldn't start, got taxi, missed flight, went to desk (Aer Lingus thank Christ - & this was a few years back), the lady printed ticket for next flight, no charge at all. Ahh them were the days.

    Then one time in Shannon I got on the plane and a very large, grumpy American was in my seat ex Dublin and wasn't moving. I got taken by the cabin crew (she held my hand :D) right up to the front of the old Jumbo - Piper Headsick all the way to New York :D:D:D


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 110 ✭✭orlaanne


    Missed a connection to Toronto in Heathrow in 2004 because Irish ATC went down that morning. Flight to London was delayed by 2 hours, when we got to Heathrow we sprinted from one terminal to the other and arrived just to see the plane pull back from the gate, had to spent the night on the floor of Heathrow because they said the ATC crash was "an act of god" and refused to put us up.

    Also not quite a missed flight but last year I was flying home from visiting a mate in Buenos Aires via Amsterdam. Got on the plane and we sat there for 4 hours before they canceled the flight due to the air con not working. Shipped to a hotel and given no info for ages, decided to tweet KLM and find out what the story was. The issued me a new ticket through Twitter to get home via Rio and Lisbon, only the Rio to Lisbon leg got delayed and I missed the only Aer Lingus connection out of the place, had to go through Heathrow instead. Boarded the plane in BA at 2am Irish time Saturday, actually got home 10pm Sunday.

    Last week again flying KLM and my flight from Toronto to Amsterdam was delayed, landed 30 minutes before my Dublin flight took off, decided not to bother running or stressing this time. Just went straight to transfers and got on the next one, much easier!


  • Hosted Moderators Posts: 1,809 ✭✭✭conor_ie


    My missus was working over in Philly a few years back and I was over visiting for a week. We decided to go to Las Vegas for a few days to get away. Left her house in good time to get into Philadelphia.. then the train out to the airport got delayed!! We ran like hell from where we got dropped off to AA's check in area only to miss it by 5 minutes!! But they were lovely about it and transferred us to the next flight to DFW without any hassle. We went off and had a lovely relaxing breakfast!!

    On the way back, we had an early flight out of Las Vegas but they were missing a crew member so they wouldn't operate the flight, ending up missing our connection in Dallas and got stuck there for 3 hours... it was late enough when we got back to Philadelphia!!


  • Closed Accounts Posts: 345 ✭✭Flier


    Went out to do the walk around one day and by the time I came back the doors had been closed and the jetbridge pulled. Luckily I convinced them that they couldn't go without me! :D

    Funny same thing happened in Chicago last week. I think I need to work on my 'presence' :pac:


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