ty97

Don't trust seat maps, trust inventory from someplace from EF.

In this case, it's possible that only 5 F seats sold, but that AA is zero'ing out inventory with plans to op-up J to F, and op-up Y to J, in order to then fill Y and get as many people out was possible. They need to use every available seat to clear the backlog.

g1ant

Yes, tut ut, how terrible. London has seen the worst snow for 20 years this week. The delays of 4-5 days are caused because most of the flights on those days are already full. It's Christmas week, of course planes are full.

Seems that people around here have very short memories.

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/ameri...llow-ahhh.html

JDiver

All airlines in / out of LHR are dealing with 2 - 3 day backlogs at the least, as well as the passengers booked for a busy Christmas season; it appears there are still a couple of days' worth of bad weather in store as well. AA has a travel policy in place for LHR and some other European airports:

Northern Europe, Manchester/Chicago Travel Policies.

ty97

It snowed in London on Saturday. Flights were affected, as people would expect at any airport receiving snow (see your liked thread about Chicago, for example).

However, Heathrow was all but closed on Sunday still. And Monday (morning at least) is still looking iffy.

If that happened in Chicago, people would be fired on the spot.

There is a lot more to this than Christmas week travel loads.

JDiver

Link to travel policy

N.B. Things can change quickly, this post will no longer be updated as I am on the road, and it is possible I have copied incorrectly or made a tyope - click on the link above and read for yourself to verify, please.

(Dec 21, 2010, 9:30 AM Central)

Europe Travel Policy Travel Policy
Due to the continuing weather situation in Europe, American Airlines offers customers the convenience to change their travel plans. Customers ticketed to travel on American Airlines flights to or from the areas listed may change flights as shown without penalty.

If you are traveling to/from/through:On the following date:And your ticket was issued no later than:You may begin travel as late as:One ticketed change is allowed with no penalty.


London Heathrow Travel Policy
Due to weather conditions affecting London Heathrow, UK, American Airlines, British Airways and Iberia offer customers the convenience to change their travel plans. Customers ticketed to travel on AA/AA*/BA/IB to/from/through the airports listed below may change flights as shown below.

If you are traveling to/from/through: On the following date:And your ticket was issued no later than:You may begin travel as late as:One ticketed change is allowed with no penalty.

Manchester travel policy is now over.

To change travel dates or for questions regarding refunds, contact our
Reservations personnel at 1-800-433-7300 within the United States or
Canada. If you are calling from outside the United States or Canada,
please check our Worldwide Reservations Numbers page <link>.

These may well be extended due to weather exigencies.

lightbulb

AA flights are still getting cancelled while BA flights with the similar departing times are not. The "rumor" all day is that BA is getting priority. If you're on a codeshare with BA, you *might* have higher odds of leaving or getting to LHR.

mvoight

Maybe more BA flights are leaving because BA has more flights.
I am actually hoping my flight connection on 12/24 is canceled in Chicago, as I can get to my destination faster by driving... unless the snow is blocking the road. 3 of us are on the same itin. outbound, but only 2 on the return, as my daughter is going back to So Calif. So, outbound and return are separate. I know I can skip the connecting flight on the outbound and not cause issues with the return, but I need to be able to dump the return and would use Irrops on the outbound to request a change to the return. Otherwise, if I canceled the second leg of the outbound, I would have to pay $150 for a one way car rental dropfee.
A flight change for DFW-ORD left me an auto changed connection at 50 minutes in DFW on 12/24. Rather than risk missing that connection, I opted for a 5 hour ORD connection. Now, I have second thoughts

zman

In the winter;
LHR gets this amount of snow once every few years.
ORD gets this amount of snow once every few weeks.

ty97

Again, I'm not getting on Heathrow's case for the day that it was snowing (Saturday) because disruption is expected in that case.

But it wasn't snowing Sunday and just about every flight canceled.
It won't snow Monday, but BAA has announced that a limited number of flights will operate.

It appears that Heathrow can't handle below-freezing temperatures. That's a problem.

galaticos

I second that...I am one of the ones currently stranded at LHR in this mess..while saturday could be excused (i say could be bcause it still wasnt more than 4-5 inches of snow), they just have no excuse for getting trucks/ploughs out there and salting the hell out of the taxiways to get planes moving...i was at LHR T4 all night on saturday and the first PA on sunday morning 5am was that ALL FLIGHTS from T4 are cancelled...ridiculous...they are saying they cant operate because there's freezing weather icing the ways...that's what salt is there for..how do you think a place like Anchorage or Fairbanks operates in winter when barraged with snow...ORD / MSP / DTW are similarly busy and still get on much better in winter...ORD for a fact i know, even at the prospect of snow, first thing they do is get the trucks out with bucket load of salt ...

BAA should be embarassed if they call this a successful management...for sure someone at ORD would be fired if they did this...

ssing

Why do folks keep comparing LHR to ORD? LHR can't and should not spend money to be preapred for such exceptional events. These events are a routine for ORD so obviosuly they have to be prepared for it. LHR is not ORD and that's how it is.

The primary focus should be on ensuring pubicl safety/security and the resources need to deployed accordingly. It is easy to do this monday morning quarterbacking by comparing apples to oranges.

Petrus

Heads will roll at BAA, don't sweat about that. The Mayor of London called them to ask what they are doing.

Interestingly Gatwick, which was run by BAA until a few years ago (BAA was forced to break up Monopoly, sold Gatwick) is looking like nearly full ops Monday. And what a coincidence Gatwick has generally improved immensely since the forced BAA sale.

Go figure. BAA are a disgrace and have been for years. I was due to fly on one of the two BA flights leaving JFK tonight but my connection on Monday is canceled and no availability from LHR until Wednesday. Rather stuck in an apartment in NYC for 2 extra days (hopefully) than risking being caught in the mayhem in London.

tom911

Was BAA government owned at one time? Isn't it a Spanish company that owns it now?

demkr

BAA is an utter failure. I agree with both posters-one would not expect LHR to be on par with ORD, but there's a massive room for improvement. Sorry to all the travelers who are affected.

Here's to hoping they don't experience another storm like this when I am there in a month

g1ant

You cannot seriously compare the way that Anchorage deals with snow with the way that London does ????