Hello everybody!
SoCalFlyer97 went to SJC a few days ago. Playful spooks arrived at SAN's Southwest ticket and gate counters with some even "boarding" the flight. Had some good times at my second of five hotels of my Five One Nighters at Five Inns journey. And Southwest's Operations saves my return flight home from cancellation following a last-minute staff emergency. Here's the rundown...
Halloween Decorations: Southwest was the only airline in all of SAN's Terminal 1 that I saw with the fun and festive fall décor. Here are some of the decorated gate CSA counters:
Outbound Flight:
Plane: 737-MAX8, Full Flight, On Time
Preboarders: 2
Here are the two spooks that came along for the ride with one of them even greeting passengers at the forward entry door.
I'm sure they both buckled up too whenever the seatbelt light was on...
Go Remy's!
Overcast over Silicon:
Welcome to San Jose!
Upon arrival, I had some extra time; stayed airside to observe when the A-Listers were cleared to board at other gates in between the A and B Groups per the respective topic thread.
Took care of some business. At the MLK Library.
Don't delay this bird's flight plans!
The lodge...
Details to come in the Five One Nighters at Five Inns thread!
Return Flight:
Plane: 737-MAX8, 57% Full, Initially behind 15 minutes
Preboarders: 6
Crossed through the TSA Checkpoint and won their random secondary inspection lottery via the PreCheck Lane. The selected random secondary was a 20-second body scan inspection instead of going through PreCheck's metal detectors but I was allowed to keep my shoes and belt on.
Once I found out that the inbound plane was going to be 15 minutes late, I tracked it via Flight Aware and determined it was safe to go to an empty gate to get some work done until it showed. It departed from PHX. Came back to the gate once the tracker showed that the aircraft landed.
And then, right at the 15 minute mark, the Gate Ops Agent announced that the First Officer for our flight had an emergency and had to return to his home city...Indefinite hold on the flight.
He kept the mood positive in the gate area and kept the passengers updated on the Operations Department progress of finding a replacement FO. During the uncertainty, I checked the Southwest App and confirmed the next departing flight had seats available online via Same Day Flight Change in case they had to scrap the flight which would have been the worst case scenario. I decided to wait for the update on the FO. About 15 minutes later, the agent announced that one was found "somewhere" in the airport and was reassigned to our flight. Hurray!
A short while after that, he arrives and everybody in the gate area clapped in cheer, knowing our flight was good to go!
After the crews did their preflight checks, we all lined up to board. FA's assisted with getting everybody seated and spread out. After that entire ordeal, we left the gate and had one last obstacle: about a 12 minute tarmac hold due to air traffic at SAN. And finally...
After we got off the ground, the flight recovered a bunch of time en-route and was only 40 minutes behind schedule upon landing at SAN! As far as I'm aware, people who had connections still made them with time to spare!
Southwest Operations did a fantastic job at saving my return flight. What could have been a terrible last-minute flight disruption turned out to be only a moderate delay thanks to the teamwork and doing-what-ever-it-takes principle.
I've sent a compliment email over Southwest Customer Service. The Ops Agent, FO and the entire flight staff are certainly due a praise.
Next scheduled trip is in November.
Safe Travels!
SAN's New T1 Construction Progress:
Past Trip Reports:
https://community.southwest.com/t5/Inflight-Experience/Sept-23-Photo-Trip-Report-SAN-LAS-with-2x-TSA...
