American Airlines

On June 15, 2018 I was supposed to fly for the first time by myself at 6:55pm to Charlotte North Carolina from Florida. My plane was supposed to land and then I would get a 54 min lay over in Charlotte before jumping on another plane at 10:30pm and arriving in Newport News at 11:44pm for my cousin’s wedding. That was the plan and it was supposed to work like charm.

Boy was I wrong

My first flight got delayed to 7:35pm which would make me arrive in NC at 10pm. This first delay would’ve made me miss my connecting flight. I called my parents because they’re who I usually travel with and they flown multiple times before. My parents told me to talk to the people at the gate to see if they’ll be able to put me on another flight once I land in NC since I would miss my flight. Well I talked to the people at the gate and they said that there’s another flight at 7:40 am in the morning and that they have hotels to put me in since I would be staying overnight. I was okay with this. It seemed easy enough, right?

I told my parents and they said okay sounds good. I got to Charlotte and IT WAS A COMPLETE NIGHTMARE.

There were easily over a thousand people waiting to be put on a flight to go to their destination. When I landed my next flight was cancelled. And I waited over an hour to talk to somebody at my exit gate. When I finally was able to talk to someone they just directed me to a customer service desk that was down the hall. Well 10 min later I find customer service only to see a line extending from it and going back to where I came from. So while I was walking I got a text from American Airlines saying that they booked me on a flight for 3:09pm for the next day. The wedding is at 5pm the next day. I can’t do that. That doesn’t give me enough time to fly to my destination have my parents pick me up and drive half an hour to the hotel to get ready and then go to the wedding. I was already stressing out that my flight got cancelled and that I was going to be in an airport by myself for a while so this new information made the stress and panic grow. I wanted to cry from it all.

And then on top of that, I learned that there was no hotels available because 1000s of others were still waiting on a plane and they were accommodated to the hotels first. Multiple people have been there for over 30 hours. A guy was in the same clothes for three days and it didn’t look like he was getting anywhere anytime soon either. And I’m not old enough to rent a car and just drive to Virginia. I also didn’t want my parents to drive 5 hours to get me and then drive 5 hours back to Virginia and then on Sunday drive all the way back to Florida.

So I called my parents for like the millionth time and told them what’s going on. A random American Airlines’ lady gave me the number to rebook when I explained to her I couldn’t take this rebooked flight. And that number is what I sent my dad. He called and was able to get me on a flight back home for free. I didn’t get on a flight back home till 1:30 in the morning. And I didn’t arrive back to my house until 3. The only good thing about this is that I didn’t have any luggage. Just my purse that had my wallet, my mom’s vitamins because she needs them and they didn’t arrive until after she left, my tooth brush and tooth paste, and my chargers for my phone and watch. And through it all I’m so thankful for my parents for helping me through all this. My two close friends that texted me while I was waiting, and my favorite human being ever my handsome hero (we’re not technically dating but we are it’s complicated). My handsome hero stayed up until I got home safe and sound and had me call him to make sure I was okay.

I’m not mad at the flight attendants that worked there and I tried to remember that whenever I talked to them about my flight issues. I’m just mad at the situation and I pray to god that they refund me and get a compensation of some sort. And the reason why is didn’t drive with my parents to Virginia in the first place is because I had to work Friday and I wasn’t able to get it off. So now I have a weekend of nothing to do and sorry about the long story. I tried to put gifs in there to make it seem not so log and boring.