I know most of us regular travelers have suffered through a horrible irrops situation on CO (or two), but my experience yesterday was amazing so I'll report it here.

Flight #226 (ship #328) went from IAH-BWI without issue. However, once we boarded the return flight, #1527, and closed the door, ground crew noticed a loose latch on the plane. The captain explained that the FO would go inspect and see if it was a true issue or would be fine to fly with (joking that he didn't want everyone's luggage to be lost mid-flight). FO came back and said there was also a hydraulic leak under the plane. During the ~hour that we sat there, they kept updating us on the status. After the hour passed, they offered us all to de-plane (the captain telling the FA's, "I don't want to keep anyone on the ground this long. We have to allow them the option to get off.") While off the plane, they kept announcing any updates ("found the issue", "looking to replace it", "expect another > 30 mins", etc). Finally, they said that we would be boarding ship #614 when that landed at 555pm. #614 is a 735 while #328 is a 733 (4 less FC seats now). The GA moved 4 back to coach "that were lowest on the upgrade list" instead of just bumping row 3, and re-shuffled seats. They also gave out meal vouchers and protected us all on later flights, if possible. I had some irregular plans and the managers at BWI and IAH took very good care of me.

At IAH, I think the only people to miss their connections were a pregnant lady who couldn't make the 5 minute connection and a guy going to College Station, where there were no later flights. Everyone else (that I know of) with 9PM departures made it... a 10 minute connection!

When we de-planed, they had 2 agents and a red-coat meet us with connection information and boarding passes for the later flights

The only thing that could have been handled differently was the lady with an 855 connection (TUS or PHX, I can't remember). She got to the gate at 855, but they wouldn't reopen the door for her. The manager in IAH tried to get a shuttle for the guy to College Station so he didn't have to wait until today, but was unsuccessful. CO's policy is "no rental cars due to liability issues" (but they will give travel vouchers instead of rental cars/hotels and let you fend for yourself... keep this in mind if work is picking up the tab and you're stranded in the future ).

Overall a big ^ to everyone involved last night!