BNA, no idea if they were a contract worker, the redcoat who I recognize and who has been amazing in the past, was busy helping other customers.


That's good advice and I didn't make a scene, after simply confirming there really was nothing he could do I said thank you and left.

I certainly don't disagree with your advice, I know, and could see other employees feverishly trying to help people, and giving them a well deserved pat on the back is a wonderful idea.

I tried to be kind to all the other service workers I encountered on my journey today, especially my travel agent who is also dealing with this times however many.

David Neeleman (Jetblue founder and CEO) was fired ousted over far less. Bastian probably won't be axed, but he should be.

Can we get Gil West to be CEO? Doesn't seem like he's doing much over at Hertz.

Well when I go to pick-up my rental car, my name is always on their board. Sometimes twice!

Hertz? That's one of the worst rental car companies...not sure how that qualifies one to be the CEO of one of the World's largest airlines. Unless there's a joke I'm missing here.

Delta canceled my flight.
National had no cars.
Hertz had a lovely selection.
Today Hertz was the only reason I got to my destination. I'm not usually a Hertz fan, but they earned a point in my book today.

Fair point. National actually sent out an email on Friday to the effect of: "We aren't affected by these outages! Please reach out to us if you're travel plans are interrupted". I guess it worked too well. :)

I used to be a Hertz guy, but they screwed me three times in close succession, and then I moved to National. National has been far better all the way around. Newer cars, better CS, better reward program, etc.

He’s certainly eating more than his share of premium humble pie.

The problem was Pilots and flightb attendants not in the correct airports to fly schedule flights which created a domino effect throughout the system worldwide at Delta. The crew scheduling software was affected and Delta operationally did not know where the pilots and flight attendants were, so quick staffing changes were impossible. This was a big hole to dig out of and its still an ongoing problem. Other airlines crew scheduling software was not affected, Delta seems to be the only airline impacted to this degree.

This wasnt sometrhing Ed or management at Delta expected or could plan for. The only thing they can do is rebuild a more robust crew scheduling app that will not fail in the future.

RC

You are kidding, aren't you? Everybody else seemed to be able to either plan for it (for example by having redundant systems - System Planning 101!!) or manage their way out of this disaster in a timely fashion.
Executives are paid the outrageous compensation because they are (supposedly) able to look into the future (anticipate) - for better or worse - and manage their company accordingly. Ed and Co have shown that they clearly can do neither.

It should be totally expected and planned for… because this software failed at WN just a couple months ago, and at DL at least twice in recent memory. Also, aviation is the leader in risk mitigation… FMEAs are part of the DNA. A single source of failure causing a meltdown shouldn’t happen.

Exactly - this is a KNOWN vulnerability in their system. Its happened before, and happened at other airlines. Delta knows their crew scheduling systems is their achilles heel and they've obviously done nothing to mitigate it.

That falls on the CIO and IT directors, as well as other senior leadership who are supposed to address corporate risks of this level.

Well, the premium humble has been served to him, the question is, will we see him eat it? :p

(And I doubt the board is entertaining the idea of firing the guy, he has been too good for shareholders. Unless the stock price is affected long term.)

Well if they let him go they only have to come to FlyerTalk to find "experts' who know how to run an airline :)


But as someone who has submitted budget requests for behind the scenes IT improvements while the "revenue" producing department was submitting budget requests for "assets that bring in cash" just to have the "IT improvements" passed over I'd have to know that Delta's IT shop didn't even try before firing everyone. We raised the flag numerous times until the boy who cried wolf was right and then the board and management were all over us (We then showed them "turned down requests" and they went "oh yeah...hmmm")

You raise a great point--there has been a palpable lack of investment and deferred maintenance these past few years as corporate inertia took hold. Getting executive buy-in for investment is tough. It's especially hard if, as you said, you have an environment where IT has a history of asking for toys to play with and then the day arrives where the boy who cried wolf was right. The Big 4 and large IT consultancies are and have been in trouble, not because they lose deals to competitors, but because the decision is made to not do anything at all.