Why is SW corporate being so quiet during this major holiday disaster? Where are you Bob Jordan (Southwest CEO!)
It appears that SW's alert messaging failed
Here's my Christmas story - SW's major fail on communicating: My flight out of Portland, OR to Sacramento, CA on Saturday morning (12/24) was cancelled, due to planes not able to land because of icy runways. I get that - they cancelled it as the incoming flight was about 15 minutes from landing, so the plane was turned back to its Oakland, CA origin.
I'm lucky to have rebooked a flight for the following afternoon (Sunday, 12/25). I get to the gate at boarding time of 3pm, but am told by fellow passengers that they're delaying boarding until the last crew member arrives, but, it turns out that the flight attendant is actually a no-show. No announcements, but I ask the gate agent, and she says that they're expecting a replacement from an incoming Las Vegas flight. I check Flight Aware, and the Las Vegas to Portland flight has already been cancelled. The departure time gradually creeps to 5:30pm. The gate agent and the pilot who is standing at the gate don't know anything. Still no announcement, no text message updates, and the gate agent disappears - fast forward to 7pm (Southwest's site meanwhile creeps the departure time forward), and the guy at the gate desk says "crew is set, we're just waiting for the destination airport to acknowledge that they have an open gate to receive our flight".
After more of the passengers line up to ask the status, he makes a call, and it turns out that the Sacto airport is fine, but we're still missing that "last crew member". He says that the local dispatcher is making calls to find an available flight attendant that has available hours - 7:30pm on Christmas day. Around 8:15, Southwest finally decides to cancel this flight five hours after the scheduled departure time.
I'm told that to get my credit, I should stand in line, or go online or call. Online doesn't work, because the flight no longer exists. Now I have to gird myself to prepare for a marathon wait to talk to a live person... by the way, at about 2am, I finally get a text message, telling me that my flight has been cancelled.
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