Click here for the story. The flight was cancelled because of visibility and freezing rain at ORH. Why were flights not cancelled at Bradley, TF Green, Manchester or Boston? This really worries me. If you ask me the weather obviously was not good, but really how bad was it Sunday?
What is worse is the attitude of the CEO, Judy Tull. It is the second week at ORH, which has not had a very good track history, and a reporter from the Telegram (Lisa Welch) is one of the people stranded. If I was the CEO and the reporter got me on the phone, I would be issuing travel vouchers and provide food and lodging. Think of the good public relations this could have created, if Direct Air had taken care of the passengers in Sanford and Worcester??
This is an awful way to run a business. Now I read that the people working the counters are hired from a Ohio based company called QuickFlight. The call center is not their employees, the people working the counter are not their employees, the plane and crew are Virgin America. Other then Judy and Ed, how many employees does this airline have?
Bottom line is that we need high loads on these flights and a story like this, which is deserved, hurts the airport. Last thing we need.
WRRB/Telegram District City Council Forum 10/18
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This forum is for all district council candidates; all candidates are here
today. Format: 14 total questions, 4 questions across districts (for all
candida...
6 months ago
9 comments:
Looking at the waether observations from ORH Sunday, visibility was under a half mile from 3:44 pm to at least 10:17 pm and the temperature didn't rise above freezing until sometime after 7:00 pm. Looking at the same info for PVD, BDL, BOS, and MHT, the weather was significantly better at those airports.
That doesn't excuse DirectAir's poor service, but I'm not sure any airline would have flown into ORH Sunday afternoon or night with the weather up there.
nodrumlins:
Great point thanks.. Assuming you are correct, sounds like you are, then we should have plans in place with our partner to bus people to Boston?
Bill
There were other flights in and out that day. That is not to say that those other flights compromised their safety or not by flying in adverse conditions. I could bore you with the regulations of when pilots can legally fly, however, what is more important, is not the regulation but the safety concerns of an experienced and knowledgeable pilot. If he/she deems it unsafe to go wouldn't you rather be sitting on the ground wishing you were flying, or in the air wishing you were on the ground?! With that being said, every traveler should always have a "Plan B" in place in the event any flight can't go. And likewise, every airline should have their plan B in place as well. It sounds like neither had a Plan B and both were unpreprared. Unfortunately, it is the airline that should have been prepared more than the passenger and it sounds like they were cutting their teeth on this one. The airline should have done much more in the way of communicating and accomodating their passengers. We all know, whether it is family, friends, loved ones, or business that communication is the crux of success. And for business we all know that it is customer satisfaction that creates success. It can take 20 years to build loyal customers, but only 2 minutes to lose them! Direct should have eaten this, and lost money if need be, to ensure a satisfied and returning customer. Just having line srevice doesn't cut it and is poor planning. Their should be a Direct employee at both locations, wouldn't this be common sense if it were your business? Hopefully they have learned and won't lose confidence with locals to travel out of ORH. Yes it was idiotic and poor business, but how long is the ever negative ORH beaters at T&G going to drag this out and compile it with more negativity!!?
Anonymous:
Good points, but it is tough to have a plan B) as a passenger when you are flying out of secondary airports like Sanford, Punta Gorda and Worcester.
The airline should have a plan B in place. Since we have a partner in MassPort it only makes sense to divert landings and take offs to Boston in the event Worcester is not accessible.
It would be an inconvenience, but one that people would acceptable to people flying out of Worcester.
Bill
I may be in error, but I believe ORH is at an unusually high altitude (above sea level) for an airport in the eastern half of the country. This gives it a distinction for being socked in by fog, or otherwise troubled with inclement weather that, at the same points in time, won't affect other airports in the northeast.
3 sides to every story... there is the one flyer's comment who was completely satisfied and attributes the weather problem to tornado warnings in Florida, there is the T&G stating the weather problem was in Worcester as they had a reporter on one of the flights and somewhere in the middle is the truth...
Here is the real story (from a passenger who was on this flight). It had nothing to do with Worcester. Planes were grounded along the eastern seaboard due to the weather along the east coast. When this plane finalle was cleared from the gate in Fla. (some 6 hrs later) they would have been waiting for airspace for another prolonged period of time. Under D.O.T. regs, the flight crew cannot exceed a certain # of hours per day flying. This delay would have exceeded thier time. The flight was not dispatched at the airline's discretion...this is directly from a crew member. Nothing to do with Worcester. Hope this clears things up.
Stephen P.
Worcester/Punta Gorda
If the crew had any worries that they would be timed out if they didn't get off by x o'clock then why didn't they have a stanby crew ready to come in? Other airlines always are prepared for just that contingency. Poor planning and communicating by D.A. period. Didn't someone ask how big this company is? How many crew do they have hired?
Keep in mind that Direct Air is just a name...Virgin owns the aircraft and employs the crew so who is at fault and really who cares? Alot of planes were delayed due to the weather all over the east coast.... this plane was already delayed some 5 hours, now they would have to wait for airspace due to the backup and who knows how long that would be. So if you were already delayed that long, would you rather sit on a plane for possibly an hour or more waiting to go?
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