Just curious
 

what FA's really know about their delayed aircraft?

My dh was on CO28 last evening (tail #13), he had known since sat evening that the flight was going to be delayed about 3 hours due to the late arrival of the aircraft from Tel Aviv. This was just a domino effect...late departure, late arrival and so on.

This was a fact well before the Sunday morning incident at EWR....yet the FA was telling passengers that the delay was due to the UA incident!

My dh listened with amused interest and certainly felt no need to correct her.

If I were to hazard a cynical guess...I'd say they changed the story so that their compensation liability would be lessened. CO's liable if it's an MX, but if the issue is something out of their control, like a partner's disabled Airbus on on the tarmac...

Was probably a combination of things. I see it left EWR almost 5 hours late on the 9th; arrived in TLV almost 5 hours late on the 10th, and left TLV 4.5 hrs late on the 10th back for EWR. The late arrival from EWR, combined with the new security procedures for int'l arrivals into the US, and the situation with the UA plane (a runway was closed, planes were being diverted left and right), all contributed... but I would bet the UA incident had the least - if any - to do with the delay.

Regarding your cynical guess Critic, most FAs could care less about protecting the company from potential blame. We take what information is available to us, and do the best we can with it. Anyone with a brain can see the plane left EWR late, several hours before the UA incident, so there would be no reason for the FA to purposely mislead someone about the reason for the delay. There probably was merit to what he was saying, given the runway closure and diversions (but again - the UA incident still played a minimal role, more than likely, given that the inbound was 5 hours late from EWR).

not a conspiracy theory
 

I agree with LukeSkywaiter. I doubt it's some FA-sprured conspiracy theory to lessen the company's liabilities as much as they pass what info they can. They're only human and after years of observing their work, it's really not a military secret as much as good old decent customer service as best as they can do, and they do a very good job of it daily in the face of an endless stream of difficult, unsympathetic people.

Sorry - didn't mean to suggest FA shenanigans. The "they" in my hypothetical situation was intended to be CO, not the FAs.

Fair enough.. and mark my word - if CO ever asks me to "ice the cake" or mislead our customers, I will go out of my way to make sure that the customers know exactly what is going on.

Picture it.... SeaTac (can't recall the date so insert your favorite one) flying SEA to EWR. GA apologizes to all those waiting with an announcement that goes something like this.

I apologize for the delay. We are experiencing a mechanical problem as the toilet on this plane is inoperable and human waste is backing up into the plane. We have a maintenance crew working as quickly as possible to resolve this issue. (45 minutes later) We appreciate your patience during this delay. If you have not already done so, please use the restroom here at the airport as there will be no rear lavatory for use on this flight. Anything you can do to lessen the number of trips to the forward lavatories during flight will be greatly appreciated. We will begin boarding in about 10 minutes as the maintenance crews finish sealing the toilets.

Sometimes you can share too much. IMHO