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Excuses frustrate Connie Comiso, well-known Hawaii marathon runner, and fiance Craig Knohl were among some 290 disgruntled American Airlines passengers who waited out seemingly interminable delays to fly from San Francisco to Honolulu.
travelers on
American flight 39
Food and hotel vouchers
and credit for tickets may
provide some relief
By Harold Morse
Star-Bulletin"It was a frustrating, very frustrating experience," Comiso said after finally reaching here yesterday.
Delays totaled nearly 31 hours as passengers, who had boarded two Tuesday Hawaii-bound flights that returned to San Francisco, endured further flight cancellations yesterday.
The first return to San Francisco produced a reception. "All the fire trucks were lined up waiting for us," Comiso recalled.
American Airlines Flight 39 had turned back after about three hours due to loss of power in one engine on the McDonnell-Douglas DC-10.American dispatched another DC-10 from Los Angeles to take the passengers to Honolulu, but that plane had mechanical trouble and didn't leave until 11:40 p.m. Tuesday. About an hour into that flight, the crew noticed a loss of oil in an engine, turned around and landed in San Francisco at 1:53 a.m. yesterday.
"This is the hardest thing I've ever done," the pilot told passengers at the critical moment. "We have to turn back."
After the second mishap, nerves frayed. "We were like hostages there at the airport," Comiso said.
San Francisco police showed up as irate travelers waited two hours to question ticket agents. Meal vouchers and hotel vouchers helped some, but not enough. "They were not really telling us anything," Comiso said. "Four couples were newlyweds."
Taken to the hotel about 5 a.m., they were at the airport again a few hours later. "What bothered me was they made these excuses," Comiso said. "The crew got stuck in rush-hour traffic.
"It was excuse after excuse after excuse, and it was hard to believe after a while."
Compensation made seemed inadequate. "Some people were broken and really damaged," said Comiso, who missed a day's work. "I don't think the airline can compensate that sort of thing, plus we're walking around like zombies."
Wednesday's Flight 39, scheduled to depart at 9 a.m., was canceled, and passengers were given seats on American Flight 9004, which left San Francisco at 3:50 p.m. West Coast time.
Knohl was also bushed. "Yeah, it was an adventure," he said.
The departure was so hectic the crew forgot the movie video. But vouchers in the long run may give some solace, he added. There was about $100 worth of food and credit toward ticket purchases. He may be willing to fly American again, Knohl said. "Our bags were there" upon arrival here, he said.
Joe Matlen arrived on the flight yesterday with wife Nora and three children -- Bryan, 15; Aaron, 13; and Krystal, 6, from near Sacramento. He was calm, if not happy. "I guess we appreciated their efforts at safety," he said of American Airlines. "However, we felt that they were a little lacking in trying to resolve the situation. They just relied on their mechanics finding the problem and fixing it, with no backup plan."
American might have used other aircraft, Matlen added. "A lot of us felt that perhaps they should have looked to chartering a plane from someone. The delay was getting that long," he said.
"I understand we're going to get $1,000 each in ticket value, which must be used in one year," for compensation, he said.
"I think the biggest regret about the whole thing is we missed some vacation time and can't replace that."