The flight MU5125 I took delayed. It was planned to depart at 8:00 PM yesterday but we started as late as 0:15 AM this morning. I waited in the airport for 5 hours, cold and boring. When I arrived in Beijing Airport, it was already 2:00 AM. It cost me 1 hour to get to hotel. I finally went to bed around 3:30 AM in Liang Ma He Hotel (Landmark Hotel).
The delay was because of the storm in Beijing. Later, I learnt that the storm happened around 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM yesterday, and it caused long back log to all flights to Beijing. According to flight attendants, the planes waiting to land looked like flies in the sky. It took 4 hours to clear most of the flights in the queue. We were still lucky because when we arrived in PEK at 2:00 PM, there are still some passengers in the airport, waiting for their flights to depart.
Now I am in Beijing and enjoy good weather here.
Wuwu
I am still in gz for my project. Enjoy ur kick off days
xm
So you don’t come for the kickoffs?
Did you receive any compensation for the delay? I’ve read that domestic airlines in China now follow a ‘Punctuality Guideline’ that specifies reimbursement for delays etc.
No. They provide one can of free drink to me every 2 hours. Around 11:00 PM, I got cookie. And there is no more than that.
I can’t help but smile at what the airlines gave you, almost like rewarding a little boy for being patient and not complaining. I think if you brought it up, you should’ve been able to get a rebate. There are guidelines for cash reimbursements depending on how long you waited, and I would guess you could have gotten quite a bit.
In most cases, the WEATHER is the best excuse for any insurance company, and I guess that is valid for airlines too. Read the small letters too.
For a man, the most unreliable things are women and the weather… ;-)
Nobody can insure you from that.
And congratulations to you for your new job, Jianshuo !
About weather and flying, here is a story from the real life :
4 years ago I was in a plane from Manila, Philippines to Busan, Korea, a 3 hour flight.
17:00, half an hour before landing in Busan, the pilot was guided to Cheju Island just south of Korea, because the airport was closing in Busan because of bad weather.
He really hoped to go to Busan later, but unfortunately it was in fact a tropical storm (not a full typhoon), hitting between Cheju and Busan…
OK, 19:00 we didn’t knew anything, the pilot was silent as the grave.
It was getting hot inside, outside 29 and no aircon, airplane full.
It was raining, and the wind was increasing in a direction across the runway.
At 22:0 the pilot informed that we couldn’t go to Busan today, so we had to go back to Manila (!!!).
That would be ok, Manila can be lots of fun at nights, but the wind was REALLY heavy outside, approx. 80-100 km/h across the runway, and the plane was shooked by wind gusts.
There was a heavy rain; we couldn’t even see the runway from the apron (“parking” area).
I talked with some guys and said that it would be FAR more dangerous to try and leave than stay on this Island. (I have experience in flying.)
They agreed, we refused to fly and we called the steward in charge.
He would bring our request to the pilot.
Then it took 2 (two) hours more with negotiations with him, and later the local authorities.
(Note that we succeded to convice the pilot, that it was more dangerous that he thought, amazing !)
Then we could go to the KAL hotel, in a guarded bus, as they had no emigration people awake at that time.
00:30 it was time to go to bed, but we had to be ready at 5:30 for an early takeoff if the storm was weakened.
At 4:30 (ohh, my!) the staff woke us and we had a bad breakfast. To the airport, some formalities, and a long wait and then to the plane… 8:30,
after waiting 1½ hour, we could go to Busan.
I admit that I wasn’t very efficient at work that day !
Jianshuo’s experience and this story reminds me to read the actual airline’s regulations more carefully regarding payback and benefits if flights are delayed (:-)
Even if ‘Acts of God’ don’t merit monetary compensation, one drink every two hours and a cookie just don’t cut it for customer service.