Tracking Flight 91 JFK->OAK 1 June
Jun 1, 2008, 10:03 pm
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Mar 2004
Location: On the road, 24/7/365
Posts: 3,467
Tracking Flight 91 JFK->OAK 1 June
Well, this has been fun. I'm supposed to be picking up someone on this flight. The scheduled arrival time was 7:08PM. The plane 'departed' on-time, but the anticipated arrival was 8:08PM, so I figured they sat for an hour on the tarmac at JFK. About 7:50PM, just as I'm about to head for OAK, I get a call' it's my friend. She's in LAS, waiting to be refueled. (The plane, I mean, though she's long-ago run out of food.)
So she's talking to be on her cell phone, and I'm monitoring the flight at JetBlue.com. It shows the plane image moving over California and, by golly, the flight landing at OAK, with the notation (which later disappeared), 'flight diverted to OAK' - which, of course was the destination all along. 8:45PM, they close the doors in LAS.
Meanwhile, the Oakland airport shows the plane arrived at 8:26PM.
I'm heading to the airport to be there for the new scheduled arrival time of 10:05PM; any bets when she arrives?
(Rhetorical question. I'm mainly amusing myself here.)
So she's talking to be on her cell phone, and I'm monitoring the flight at JetBlue.com. It shows the plane image moving over California and, by golly, the flight landing at OAK, with the notation (which later disappeared), 'flight diverted to OAK' - which, of course was the destination all along. 8:45PM, they close the doors in LAS.
Meanwhile, the Oakland airport shows the plane arrived at 8:26PM.
I'm heading to the airport to be there for the new scheduled arrival time of 10:05PM; any bets when she arrives?
(Rhetorical question. I'm mainly amusing myself here.)
Jun 2, 2008, 12:34 pm
#2
Join Date: Apr 2006
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Posts: 2,164
I worked flight 95 JFK-OAK yesterday and can shed some light onto the diversion.
From what I see the flight was pretty full and most likely had a lot of baggage. We almost had to divert for this very reason. JFK was backed up as usual they where only using 1 runway for all departures so there was a 45-60 minute wait. Not to bad there as we build that into the schedule. All heck started to break loose as we flew through Nebraska. There was a nasty line of thunderstorms that built up towering over us. We had FL340 and where too heavy to climb to FL380 to get above them and if we went down to FL280 we would burn too much fuel. So we moved around the storms and encountered some good turbulance while many planes where diverting 100nm or so to the south to avoid the weather. We couldn't go that far because we would not be able to make it to OAK safely. I'm betting the Captain of your friends flight decided to fly further south to avoid the majority of the turbulance and divert instead of staying close to the weather like we did and just press forward so we didn't have to stop.
*Note* I was in the flight deck during this time and at no point was the flight in any type of danger just had a rough ride for about 10 minutes.
From what I see the flight was pretty full and most likely had a lot of baggage. We almost had to divert for this very reason. JFK was backed up as usual they where only using 1 runway for all departures so there was a 45-60 minute wait. Not to bad there as we build that into the schedule. All heck started to break loose as we flew through Nebraska. There was a nasty line of thunderstorms that built up towering over us. We had FL340 and where too heavy to climb to FL380 to get above them and if we went down to FL280 we would burn too much fuel. So we moved around the storms and encountered some good turbulance while many planes where diverting 100nm or so to the south to avoid the weather. We couldn't go that far because we would not be able to make it to OAK safely. I'm betting the Captain of your friends flight decided to fly further south to avoid the majority of the turbulance and divert instead of staying close to the weather like we did and just press forward so we didn't have to stop.
*Note* I was in the flight deck during this time and at no point was the flight in any type of danger just had a rough ride for about 10 minutes.
Jun 3, 2008, 12:49 pm
#3
Join Date: Feb 2008
Programs: AA GLD
Posts: 97
I worked flight 95 JFK-OAK yesterday and can shed some light onto the diversion.
From what I see the flight was pretty full and most likely had a lot of baggage. We almost had to divert for this very reason. JFK was backed up as usual they where only using 1 runway for all departures so there was a 45-60 minute wait. Not to bad there as we build that into the schedule. All heck started to break loose as we flew through Nebraska. There was a nasty line of thunderstorms that built up towering over us. We had FL340 and where too heavy to climb to FL380 to get above them and if we went down to FL280 we would burn too much fuel. So we moved around the storms and encountered some good turbulance while many planes where diverting 100nm or so to the south to avoid the weather. We couldn't go that far because we would not be able to make it to OAK safely. I'm betting the Captain of your friends flight decided to fly further south to avoid the majority of the turbulance and divert instead of staying close to the weather like we did and just press forward so we didn't have to stop.
*Note* I was in the flight deck during this time and at no point was the flight in any type of danger just had a rough ride for about 10 minutes.
From what I see the flight was pretty full and most likely had a lot of baggage. We almost had to divert for this very reason. JFK was backed up as usual they where only using 1 runway for all departures so there was a 45-60 minute wait. Not to bad there as we build that into the schedule. All heck started to break loose as we flew through Nebraska. There was a nasty line of thunderstorms that built up towering over us. We had FL340 and where too heavy to climb to FL380 to get above them and if we went down to FL280 we would burn too much fuel. So we moved around the storms and encountered some good turbulance while many planes where diverting 100nm or so to the south to avoid the weather. We couldn't go that far because we would not be able to make it to OAK safely. I'm betting the Captain of your friends flight decided to fly further south to avoid the majority of the turbulance and divert instead of staying close to the weather like we did and just press forward so we didn't have to stop.
*Note* I was in the flight deck during this time and at no point was the flight in any type of danger just had a rough ride for about 10 minutes.