DTW Flight cancelled today.
 

ORD-DTW At 4pm, i think it was flight #1250, for "aircraft maintenance."

Passengers are being rebooked on the next flight at 6pm.

What compensation should Gold Elite flyers expect?

None, cancellations happen.

only 2 hours? mebbe the voucher pack. :confused:

Email them (see Talk To Us feature on the contact page) and you should get a few WPMs from them.

I suppose the alternative would be to fly a defective plane...

What? Only a $5 phone card and 500-mile coupon?

No $250 TCV AND 20k WPM? :confused: :confused:

If by defective you mean empty. Note the reported cause was in quotes:

aircraft maintenance = defective plane
"aircraft maintenance" = lightly loaded plane

Slightly OT, but when I lived in PIT US was well-known for cancelling the PIT-HPN flight for "aircraft maintenance" and rerouting pax onto PIT-LGA, and then bussing them up. I did that twice on six scheduled trips.

And exactly what purpose would it serve to have a perfectly good plane sitting at ORD? They are going to have to fly the plane somewhere for its next scheduled flight, or back to DTW/MSP/MEM to get it back in the rotation.

Planes can not just be pulled out of the schedule at will because of light loads, especially at non-hub locations. If it was DTW-ORD that might be more plausible. This is brought up every time there is a mx issue, and it is also brought up that it would create a ripple effect throughout the system that could cost the airline much more than flying a lightly loaded flight would.

Yeah - AA was notorious for that in the early-mid 1990s out of PHL, too. When I was delayed/cancelled so they could consilidate pax for three flights in a row, I swore off of them forthe next ten years. I really, really, really hope that NW isn't going to start pulling that crap...

peace,
~Ben~

Is the plane sitting in ORD? Or did they cancel both directions?

It has already been acknowledged by many airline employees that this does indeed happen, whether directly or indirectly:

If any plane goes mechanical, they may pull a similar plane from a relatively empty flight (or an empty turn) to accommodate a fuller one, thereby cancelling the lighter one. So your lightly loaded flight has a larger chance of being cancelled due to "mechanical" reasons than a full plane.

250 mile coupon. :)

The implications of a cancelled flight like that are probably more complicated than you think. Crews and planes need to be at the right place and time for the next flights. Cargo needs to be delivered. Why not be a little bit cynical and have NW claim a weather delay (I am sure the weather was bad somewhere)? What you reports are more "urban legends".

When NW has cancelled flights because of loads they have reported that to me as much. Usually for a A to B back to A flight where both legs were empty.

I am not saying that it can not happen, but I have never been on a plane with a "light" load from ORD to either DTW or MSP. In fact I have volunteered on several flights out of ORD to DTW and MSP.

ORD is one of the busiest airports in the world (not the busiesest, but definitly in the top 10 or so). That does not equate to every flight being full, but they have a lot of traffic through that airport. NW generally does not have WC's in airports that do not have a lot of NW traffic and ORD has one that is shared with CO. None of these factors indicate how many people were actually booked on the cancelled flight, but I don't think it would qualify as a light load.

Is there any way to find that out after the cancellation? It would be interesting to know how many people actually had to be reacommodated.

I do not know what was wrong with the AC, but looking in the system, it was canceled due to maint. If you are talking about flight 1248 that was supposed to leave at 4:07 PM

As a Plat, I recieved 2500 magically in my account about 5 days after a simular situation. If you don't get something in the next week, use the talk to us feature on the website and let them know how you feel.