Ned123USA

This is my first post:

On Friday 8/7 - I was flying on AA from DFW to EWR... Arrived at the airport on time, boarded plane and was told there was mechanical problem. After 1/2hour we deplaned and were told to sit tight. After 41/2 hours with very little communications from the Gate Agents, we were told they could not fix the plane and another was being located. We boarded another plane and after an appology we were on our way 5 1/2 hours from scheduled depature. 2 hours into the flight the pilot comes on the air and said we have a mechanical problem and to be safe, we are going to land in Indy (IND). After a bit of commotion in the back of the main cabin and visibly distressed passengers and crew, the pilot comes back on the air and said he has declared an emergency and that we will be landing with emergency services on the field.

As we approached the airport you could tell that the plane was experiencing severe mechanical problems. We had a rough landing around 11:30PM with all the emergency vehicles on the runway. They followed us as we slowly, very slowly came to a stop. The fire trucks surrounded the plane and we watched the firemen in their silver fire suits inspect the plane. After what seemed like an eternity we taxied to the terminal followed by emergency services. Again they held us on the plane for what seemed like 1/2 hour but was probably only 10 minutes. The pilot came on and said we lost one of our 2 engines and had some sort of fluid leaking from the wing. I assume he landed the plane with only one engine and no reverse thrusters... The pilot and the entire crew were outstanding!!!! This pilot deserves a raise!!! I have nothing but admiration for him and the crew!!!!!

AA put us up in a hotel (1:30AM) and the next morning (7:30AM) we on our way to Newark. Needless to say I didn't sleep!!!!!

I should also mention on the flight down to DFW we also had a mechanical problem that created a 2 hour delay. 3 mechanical problems on 1 trip???

I guess I have 2 questions:

1) Does AA have a history of mechanical problems?

2) Should I ask for and recieve some sort of compensation - not for the emergency landing, but for AA jerking us around for 4 1/2 hours while they tried to fix the first plane? If so what is the best way to go about asking for and recieving comp?

wharvey

First, welcome to Flyertalk.

Second, there is actually an American Airlines Forum where you might find more specific support.

I am happy to hear that you are safe... I think that is the most important issue here. It sounds like you had a crew that performed very well.... you might want to send a note to AA recognizing their efforts.

I do not believe that AA has any more mechanical problems than any other major airline. Realize that every time a flight is late or cancelled, it causes ripple effects throughout the system... airlines do not have spare planes and crews sitting around waiting to be called into action. And, no one would willingly fly planes that were knowingly unsafe. Seems like you just happen to hit an unlucky stretch.

I would expect that AA is working on some compensation... but if you want to push it, you should send a note to AA Customer Service... their email address is on their website... and detail your concerns and inconvenience. You will probably receive a voucher for future travel.

Do contribute to FT!

Ocn Vw 1K

Ned... welcome to FlyerTalk! I agree with wharvey, that this is best discussed in our American Airlines forum, and I'll move it there. (There might be a thread already on this situation and the American Air forum moderators could choose to merge it with any existing thread.) Ocn Vw 1K, Moderator, TravelBuzz.

pushback

I would imagine your landing was VERY rough if there were emergency vehicles on the runway!

vail

The staff at AA are fine.
The aircraft are old--and I think they are accidents waiting to happen.
Too many flight delays, pilots having to wait to takeoff.
The management at AA is clearly inept.

[deleted off topic response -- stay on topic to OP]

vail

2.--4.5 hours of waiting for replacement aircraft has become SOP.
The other alternative is AA cancel's the flight and offers a refund.

dstan

Welcome to FlyerTalk, Ned123USA!

Sorry to hear about your experience. I'm sure that everyone here is glad to hear that you landed safely. Having been in an emergency landing with smoke in the cockpit, I know it can be a hair-raising experience. Emergencies can, of course, occur on any airline. AA's fleet of MD80s is, indeed, aging, but are subject to frequent, regular safety inspections (see the bottom of this page) and, since they still make up a large portion of the AA fleet, many of us here fly on them frequently without a second thought.

To your second question, you may actually receive compensation proactively from AA. (See our Compensation thread and wiki page). You can, of course, also choose to request compensation explicitly by emailing Customer Relations at AA.com. Take a look at the last few pages of the Compensation thread to get an idea of what you might ask for in this instance; you might be able to get miles or a dollar-denominated voucher. You might also include your compliments to the crew in your message.

Again, glad you made it in safely and hope that you will stick around to take advantage of the many resources in this forum!

DillMan

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (SymbianOS/9.1; U; en-us) AppleWebKit/413 (KHTML, like Gecko) Safari/413 es61i)

That's an awfully strong statement. Can you please post the dataset you collected to draw that conclusion. You are an A&P who fully understands AA's C-checks and the kinds of issues they see therein, right?

zman

Do u really think AA is the only airline that has mechanical issues?

http://avherald.com/

MiamiAirport Formerly NY George

NEDUSA123, I am very happy to hear that you are safe and that the crew performed well under stress.

AA will compensate you. IMHO I would wait and see what they offer. If it is not adequate, then an email to customer service may in order.

A/C are no different than automobiles, they at times need unexpected repair work. While I think that the aging a/c at AA cause more delays (again IHMO) I would not say that the a/c are unsafe. What happened to you was very unusual but could as easily happened on UA, US, DL, CO, etc...

highschoolband

I was on a flight last night from MIA to DCA that had a missed landing in DCA due to weather. After circling around DCA for about ten minutes the pilot said we didn't have enough fuel to keep circling and they sent us to IAD. After taxiing for about 45 minutes we got refueled and then sent back over to DCA, arriving 2 hours late.

At first I was really angry at AA for not letting us disembark at IAD, and I was already contemplating the angry letter I wanted to send AA demanding some sort of compensation. In the end though, I realized that this was simply one of the problems with traveling and I am much happier having a cautious and professional airline, than a reckless one.

Obviously my situation is much different than OP's, for whom the fault was not an act of God but rather a result of AA's aging fleet. Perhaps he deserves some compensation (read the compensation thread on the AA forum), but in the end, it seems to me that the situation is just one of the many annoyances of traveling these days. If OP wants to pull his joker, he can probably get 10 to 15k miles out of the situation, and maybe that's worth it, but that's about it.

martin33

We're all entitled to our opinions on the staff's fineness or lack thereof, and perhaps even on the ineptness of AA's management, or lack thereof.

Calling the aircraft accidents-in-waiting is totally unwarranted. Is there a single shred of evidence showing aircraft age is a factor in accidents, per se? Aircraft age in takeoff/landing cycles, not years like people do, and in any event their "age" has been well tracked and taken account of ever since the Comet crashes of 1954.

Is it, then, an issue of trust? If so, then we ought to be asking: whom would one trust more, AA's vastly experienced fleet of in-house mechanics, or UA's (or others'?) mystery lots of outsourced someones?

zman

I would rather ride on an old Boeing/MD80 then a semi new Airbus

ESpen36

Agreed. Some, like the pilots and FAs on the OP's flight, clearly are superb and definitely deserve raises.

Some are. Some aren't. Quite a few of the 752s are showing their age.

If you're referring to ground delays / ground stops, those have nothing to do with AA. Write to your Congresspeople about the obsolete ATC system.

How is that relevant? Or do you mean the ground staff at DFW?

I do find it rather surprising that it took so long to locate a replacement 752 at DFW, which happens to be AA's home base. Then again, DFW-EWR is not exactly a high-priority route for AA dispatch. If it had been a Europe or Asia flight with a MX problem, a new aircraft probably would have been called into service more quickly, instead of dithering around trying to fix the broken one.

In any event, kudos to the fantastic crew for landing the aircraft safely!

wonderbret

+1

+1

This was a bad situation in which the staff and pilots responded excelptionally well under pressure. While this isn't exactly confidence building per se, it makes me want to stick with AA even more because this can happen on any plane, and any airline.