a couple of weeks ago i was flying to mexico. the nonstop was booked solid so i got a SEA-LAX-PVR ticket. this was an early morning flight.

the connection was only 40 minutes in LAX but unfortunately as we were about to leave the gate, there was an issue on the plane and we were delayed for about an hour.

the pilot explained that luggage had shifted and slammed into a hatch causing the hatch to break. the baggage handlers forced the hatch to open to remove the bags last night but didn't fix it so now the hatch wasn't closing properly. the technicians weren't in yet so we had to wait.

an hour later, the techs came and fixed it in a few minutes and we were on our way.

there were a lot of people on the flight really nervous about connecting flights to cabo, puerto vallarta, etc. and i was definitely one of them. i thought i would miss our flight but the pilot said that he would make up time in the air and his estimated time of arrival was 15 minutes before our flight was to take off.

the flight attendant told people not to worry too much because alaska knows about this flight and since we're all booked on various alaska flights, they won't just leave us stranded. alaska only has 1 flight per day to mexico.

in the end, we arrived at 10 minutes before the departure time, barely got out of that plane (they told ppl who didn't have connections to stay on the plane and let those of us pass through but not everyone complied). i made it to the gate with about 2 minutes to spare and my wife made it right on the dot (she was getting the baby stroller that was gate checked). we were the only 2 on the plane so as soon as we got on, it took off.

so what would have happened if we were delayed for a longer time? e.g. 1 hour? would they have actually held the plane for us? would they book us on another airline? would we have to wait 1 day for the only flight on the next day? if so, would they cover hotel and anything else?

i was impressed that our checked in luggage also made it.