I have finally topped my all time stupid move in an airport. Feeling a little smug I was reading the paper this morning about how July was the second worst month for delays in the airline industry since they started keeping score. During this epic carnage I’ve been able to dance around delays for the last couple of months. It would be ingratiating to attribute it to my exceptional knowledge of the airline industry, but in reality it is just random luck. The article indicated that in June 367 flights endured more than a three hour runway delay. With a great sense of accomplishment I’m happy to state that not one of those flights was I a passenger on. The airlines must be distributing the punishment to some other deserving folks and leaving their old whipping boy alone.
Here I am sitting in BWI happily reading about what will be considered by travelers as the worst travel month in airline history waiting for my flight home. Early completion of my business meetings facilitated a four hour early arrival to the airport. During a leisurely stroll to my gate I noticed an earlier flight home leaving at 11:40 am connecting through St. Louis arriving at 2:10 pm. My direct flight was scheduled to leave 12:55 pm, arriving at 2:30 pm. Briefly I considered the potential for delay in St. Louis for only a 20 minute arrival advantage and decided to pass on the first flight for the safe bet of the direct flight. All seemed smooth sailing with blue skies from coast to coast.
I started the computer and got involved working on some reports. Checking my watch occasionally the hours passed quickly. I watched as the gate attendant asked for volunteers to give up their seat on the Kansas City flight in exchange for two hundred dollars and a round trip coupon. Gradually they loaded up the plane and pushed off from the gate. Heavily focused on the work at hand, I didn’t pay much attention to the activities surrounding me at the gate. As the watch crept closer to my departure time I put away the computer and began to get ready to board the flight home. Funny I thought the gate was A2 right where I was sitting. No need for concern they change gates all the time. The alarm went off when I looked at the status board and my flight was not listed. Oh No! My watch was still set on Central Time and my flight was Eastern Time.
Then the realization struck me like a car wreck. I just missed my flight after getting to the airport four hours early. It wasn’t the normal missed flight where you are stuck in traffic or at the other concourse with a broken tram shuttle. I was sitting at my gate not 20 feet from the door. What I assumed to be the first Kansas City flight was my direct flight. If I have actually been on the earlier flight they would have been boarding St. Louis not Kansas City. The simple facts never dawned on me. In the process the entire aircraft of passengers had to walk around me to get onto the flight and I sat there smiling at them stone cold brain dead. I continued to sit there watch them close the door and push off the gate. At one point, I actually smiled at the pilot as he called for the tug. Since they needed someone to miss the flight to get all the standby passengers on board, they never called my name to board. Someone should have taken pity on the poor retarded person sitting in bliss at the gate but it never happened.
Funny you know a missed flight looks like just every other flight leaving the airport when you’re sitting watching it from the terminal window. Nothing really out of the ordinary as it rolls away without you. Somewhere in the back of my mind I thought “Suckers, I bet I’ll still beat them to Kansas City. They’ll certainly take a hit in St. Louis". The insult added to injury was the fact that they were asking for people to volunteer to take a later flight for 200 hundred dollars and a free roundtrip coupon. In my best Forest Gump impersonation I smile politely as they begged for people to give up their seat. No not me, I’ll wait until the offer expires before I realize that is my flight. Not only did I give up my seat but I failed to even get compensated for it. For my ignorance and the heavy summer travel schedule I was unable to get on the 2:30 through Chicago, the 4:35 through Chicago, the 5:05 through St. Louis and the 6:05 through Nashville, all of which I waited at the gate as a standby passenger. After mugging some poor elderly gentleman in the restroom I was able to obtain a seat on the oversold 7:30 direct flight. The day turned into a 10 hour delay. It serve me right to tempt fate and make fun of the travel gods.
“Education is a progressive discovery of our own ignorance.”
Will Durant (1885 - 1981)
