LEONIDES

Why does United fly this tiny plane on this 1600 mile route? Do they really have that little business? Is WN and AA completely kicking their butts in the NYC market? Is it either this, or drop the LGA routes, like they did with JFK?

I was on an IAH-LGA flight on Saturday. It was delayed due to the weight restrictions caused by the jet stream dipping south. At first, the pilot threatened to offload half of the customers. He wanted 30 persons to take an alternate flight out of Newark. Not enough people took the offer. So instead, he decided to fly to Savannah (SAV) of all places. We then had to fly west back to IAH.

(The flight was even more miserable than that. The lavs ran out of potable water. The flight attendants ran out of food and drinks. There was no catering crew in SAV to re-cater the plane. An engine light came on, and we had to wait an extra hour, for a maintenance person to come out, and check out the light. Predictably, it turned out to be nothing. We arrived five hours later into IAH. And to put a cherry on top of it, the bags came off the wrong carousel, after which the lazy personnel in IAH baggage claim didn't even both to announce the proper carousel to get our bags. God, those people suck.)

All in all, it was a completely miserably flight, all because United refuses to use a 737 or A319 when flying this route - into the nation's biggest city. It makes no sense - like most of what transpires on this airline.

This is the last damned time that I take a E175 cross country. I am done with this. If I have to switch to WN to avoid this, I will.