Good to See That AA At Least Has SOME Policy Regarding Delays
At first, I was going to post this in the other thread regarding the new policy, but then I thought it's probably a hijack of that thread.
AA suggests that the "four-hour" policy will probably never be used. While it is true that I have not been stranded on an AA flight on the runway for more than four hours, I have been stranded on one for at least two hours many, many times.
Most recently, on a JFK-LAX flight last month, we were stuck in the plane on the runway for two hours because the pilot noticed a chip in the windshield of the cockpit, and they had to get a ground crew out to measure the chip and decide whether it was within the FAA's allowable depth for such chips. To make up for the delay, the flight crew handed out free earbuds in coach. Didn't help much, since the IFE in our seats was broken. A friendly FA advised me that broken IFE systems and other internal comfort systems are "par for the course" on AA planes flying the last of several flights of their day. In any event, it did make for quite an uncomfortable and tedious experience. Particularly loved getting into LAX at about 1:50 am instead of 11:30 pm, when we had been scheduled (due to headwinds, no time was made up in flight, and the plane was delayed a bit more).
I can only imagine what hell it must have been for those stranded for 8+ hours.