Originally Posted by
michaelstant
I know the logistics at the airport are complex but wouldn’t you think they could get the food from the plane and drive it over to the new plane in a few minutes?
Unfortunate that it happened, but it probably wasn't a quick fix. As @
navydevildoc points out, if it was a different aircraft type, they'd have different carts, and just swapping things between the two carts could easily take 10 minutes. Even if it wasn't a cart switch, but they've got to deliver the food via the little trucks, and airplanes get the right of way on the tarmac, so you're looking at several more minutes for them to route the food over. And we've all seen them load the food, that easily takes 5 minutes, maybe 10, including elevating the load, etc.
In all, wouldn't be unreasonable to assume about a 30 minute delay... all just guesses of course. But it's not a 7 minute fix.
I had a flight significantly delayed last year, we didn't leave til nearly 3AM (originally scheduled for 7PM). The FC FA informed us that they were not taking a food delivery and would only have light snacks, but she figured we'd prefer to get going ASAP instead of waiting 45 minutes to load meals. Everyone in FC was nodding in agreement.
Obviously I'm not sure 45 minutes was standard, or if she was exaggerating, and it obviously doesn't take that long for a planned load... but it didn't seem unrealistic.