The Denver Disaster
Posted by Christina | | Posted On Saturday, June 2, 2012 at 11:14 AM
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| Hanging in Estes before the disaster |
It started off so innocently. With just one more year to go
on our three-year trial of Nashville, we thought we’d take our flight and hotel
rewards points and check out Denver as a possible place to live down the road. With
300 days of sunshine, progressive values, an outdoorsy lifestyle, an active
downtown core, good food, and great proximity to family, it seemed like the
perfect place to compare to our current lifestyle in Nashville to see if we’d
be up for a switch. Despite getting sick with a nasty cold halfway through the
trip, the severity of which was greatly exacerbated by the dry air and high
elevation, we were rather enjoying our trip.
That is, until all hell broke loose on our last day.
While enjoying our final morning in downtown Denver, we got
a call from the airline saying our plane out of Denver was delayed due to
mechanical issues and we would miss our connection home to Nashville. With no
other flight options, we would be forced to stay in Denver, but would be
compensated with vouchers for future flights and a hotel room for the extra
night stay. We simply needed to go to the airport as if we were checking into
our flight and everything would be handled from there.
Exhausted and cranky from the combination of sickness and
dry air, I was in no mood to stay an extra night. But, with no other options,
we decided to enjoy a nice lunch at Osteria Marco and then make our way to the
airport to reschedule our flight and claim our vouchers.
All was good until we made it up to the airline counter.
Upon sharing the situation with the lady at the counter, she
glanced at her computer and said the delay was due to weather and not only
would they not reschedule our flight, they wouldn’t be compensating us with vouchers
or a hotel. In her words, “These things just happen and there’s nothing we can
do about it, so you’re just going to have to deal with it.”
Not one to get screwed over without a fight, Matt started
arguing with her that we had been told a completely different story over the
phone, but the lady got snotty right back and insisted that the 5 minutes
we would now have to run to our connection would be enough time and, if not, we
could just take the next flight out in the morning. Hotel, missed work, and all
other conveniences were our problem…but she could check our bag for free if
that would help.
Raging mad, Matt and I snatched up our tickets and sat down
to collect ourselves. The weather story seemed completely ridiculous – it was
blue skies in Denver and in Memphis where our connection was. We started to
look up car rentals to drive from Memphis to Nashville, but one-way rentals on
short notice were running nearly $200 a pop. With no other in-person outlet to
vent my rage, I Tweeted a note out sharing my disdain for the airline and we
headed for our gate.
Upon reaching the gate, we learned that our flight was now
delayed not just 45 minutes, but 2 hours. Now we would have no
shot at making our connection in Memphis and really would be stuck. I pulled
out my phone to shoot off another nasty gram on Twitter only to find a reply from
the airline wanting more information on my Tweets from earlier. After Tweeting back
and forth, we learned that not only had the lady at the counter lied
about the plane being delayed due to weather, we also should have received
flight vouchers and a free stay at a hotel. With new proof in our palms, we
worked with the nice folks at the gate and over Twitter and landed $300 in
vouchers and a hotel stay in Memphis. Crisis averted. Vindication at last.
And then we got on the plane.
And waited. And waited. A half hour went by and no movement.
The flight crew came around and started counting passengers. A lady behind us
started freaking out, asking question after question about the delay, the
safety of the plane and if she should fly. Irritated and exhausted, Matt couldn’t
take one more minute of the lady’s paranoia, turned around and hollered at her,
“If you want to get off the plane, you can get off! Otherwise, shut up because
you’re annoying the rest of us!” Mortified, I slumped down in my seat, praying
no one would think we were related.
Clearly sensing the mounting unrest of the passengers, a
crew member came over the loud speaker announcing that while the mechanical
issue had been repaired, it was only repaired to the point that it could land
on a dry runway. Unfortunately, it was now raining in Memphis, so the plane
could not land with so many people on board and volunteers would be needed to
deplane and take a flight out the next day. Matt bolted out of his seat and ran
to the front of the plane to ask what the compensation would be – hey, at this
point, might as well get more free stuff if we were already going to be late.
After much debating, the airline reps agreed on $400 per person in flight
vouchers. Matt hollered back at me, “Get your stuff! We’re getting off the
plane!” So, back off the plane we went.
Now $1,100 richer in flight vouchers, the airline hooked us up
with first class tickets on the first flight out in the morning, meal vouchers
and a nice hotel for the night. Feeling relieved and especially vindicated, we
enjoyed a relaxing evening and crashed.
And then morning came.
We woke up with no incident and headed down to the hotel
lobby for our 5 a.m. shuttle to the airport. We headed outside only to find one
van driving away and another loading up the airline crew. After telling
the front desk receptionist we were to be on the 5 a.m. shuttle, she whistled
for the van to return but no luck. She ran inside to call the van driver, but
he refused to turn around. She explained it was the first time they hadn’t done
a passenger head count to make sure everyone was there. Of course it was. The receptionist
contacted other hotels in the area to borrow their shuttle vans, but none would
help. After 10 minutes, Matt told her we were going to miss our flight if she
didn’t get someone fast, so she called a cab. Nearly 15 minutes later the cab
showed up…to the wrong hotel. The receptionist directed him over to our hotel
and we got in.
Heading down a back road, we were finally on the way to the
airport…until the cab driver got on the freeway GOING THE WRONG DIRECTION!!!
With just 45 minutes left to make our flight, Matt lost it. “You
f#&*ing idiot! What the f*&% are you doing?! You’re going the wrong
f@#%ing way!” In nearly 10 years of being with Matt, I’ve never seen him lose
it like that. Completely stunned and flustered, the cab driver stupidly asked, “Which
exit should I take to turn around?” Then I lost it. “We don’t know! We’re not
from here!” I started shrieking over Matt’s cursing. (I’ll just note here that
this is the exact scene we envision every time we are tempted to apply to be on
The Amazing Race, which is why we never have. We’re pretty sure our friends and
families would disown us if they saw our behavior on tv.)
After unloading nearly 24 hours of pent-up frustration and
anger on this poor cab driver, we finally made it to the airport with just 25
minutes until our flight was to depart. With bags flying, we sprinted through the
main concourse and into security where, using the power of our first class
tickets, we ran to the front of the ID check line and were quickly waved
through. Matt ran to the front of the security line, pleaded with a guy about
our situation who graciously let us cut in front of him, and rammed our bags
through without so much as taking out our laptop, taking off his belt or taking
a breath.
TSA was feeling lazy that day and didn’t question any of our
lack of compliance, and off we went sprinting toward the train. Not knowing where
our gate was, a kind lady told us which concourse our airline typically flew from and
we hopped on the train praying she was right. As it pulled into Concourse C, we
jumped off the plane and ran up the escalator, cutting off the swarms of
business travelers, and sprinted to our gate. By the grace of God, we made it
with just moments to spare before they started giving away empty seats and
closing up the plane.
When we finally touched down, I was never so happy to see
Nashville in my life. It was all I could do to refrain from dropping to my
knees and kissing the ground when we deplaned. We survived and we were home!
And although we aren’t holding the airline debacle
against Denver, Nashville
will remain home. Despite its Southern warts, we love it here and we’re not
going anywhere. And if we do, we’ll be choosing a different airline.
.JPG)
We were laughing so hard reading this...you probably don't remember your brother and I having our own Denver nightmare experience in 1999 on the way to my cousins wedding in San Diego. We got snowed into Denver because of snow in the surrounding mountains. Same situation...no other flights going out....we got lucky that we were only stuck there 14 hours...and it was 2 days after Columbine shooting...no compensation for anybody. We finally found a left luggage (which I'm sure no longer exists post 9/11 era) and stowed our bags, and paid about $40 for round trip bus tickets into Denver to spend the day. We had no coats because we were San Diego bound in late April...so we froze our butts off, but we just milled around. We called to make sure our 10 pm flight was getting out before we headed back in and had a cheap hotel on stand by and were prepared to by clean underwear at walgreens since the airline wouldn't release our checked bags to us...but we luckily got out. Unfortunately I missed the bridal shower I was supposed to be hostessing....but we made the wedding and prayed getting through Denver on the way back. I've had other snafu's through Denver on my travels to and from Spokane since them...it's a place we try to avoid at all costs if nothing else because of the airport! HA HA! Glad you are home safe and Mike says "That was God saying TN is home now!!!"