Jimmie Jet

tough day for Qantas and Melbourne, no coffee on Flt 433 as it originated in Melbourne and their is a catering strike so they dont have the coffee

the weather is crap so flights are delayed and cancelled

433 was a bit bumpy climb and descend but made it and was only 30min late

Volvo Mike

I was meant to be on QF410 at 7.15am. Was cancelled last night and shifted into QF412 at 7.30. I was seriously considering asking to be put on QF414 8am A330 and hindsight.... I should've. 412 had an engine sensor issue on take off... aborted departure so sat on the infield for 30 mins or so while they tried to sort it. Had another go at take off but same problem so back to the gate for repairs.

It was 90 mins late but this stage so many people without luggage were allowed to disembark and not fly on. After another 30 mins of waiting, they removed people who were on one of 4 different Qantas international flights and made other arrangements to get them to Sydney. Engine issues fixed, they had 74 people on their paperwork and 75 people on board. After many counting attempts and trying to determine what was going on, everyone had to disembark and then all scan tickets to get back on. At 10am, it was tight for my international connection and when we finally taxied to depart it was 10.30. Thrust applied and same engine issue....

Back to the gate and then tried to sort out how to get people moved. My connection was the last flight so was unable to get to where I needed to so changed my flight and am now back in Adelaide. Now I'll have to contact QFF as the status I would've accrued would send me to Platinum as it was booked with the double status back in February.

Was certainly a challenging day.

Regards,

Michael

og

The challenging day continued at MEL. Early afternoon I arrived in the domestic lounge with an expected 3 hr wait for my SYD flight. Staff moved me 30 min forward on my award ticket. I think they’d move anyone forward on request if possible due weather. Noted that nothing was available on any of the earlier 5 or so flights. Waited 45 min on the taxiway for runway clearance due to queue of planes and slow arrivals in low viz. A medical emergency started as we neared SYD and that meant everyone stayed on board until the medics did their magic for the unfortunate forward of me. So our almost on time push back turned out to be a 1:30 delay before we were in the Terminal.

Advocates of tight connections and that the airline will book you on the next flight if connections fail have rocks in their head - especially if weather is crap and its Friday arvo !

JClasstraveller

Knock on effect continued today. Flights cancelled in and out of SYD this morning. Mine was ok, QF409 only landed a few minutes late into MEL.

Feel fortunate actually, I had a colleague on JQ have to overnight in SYD as they cancelled the MEL he was due to leave on.

og

I expect the domestic airlines will reduce flights out of MEL during bad weather due to capacity limitations when only one runway is being used. Its the perfect opportunity to amalgamate flights which may also be under pressure from catering issues and crewing shortages. Sitting on a taxiway for 45 min does no favours to anyone. Its a cancellation risk being on a MEL-SYD 737 when the next flight is a 330.

Kiwi Flyer

SYD issues today are because only the east-west runway is being used, with resulting drop in runway capacity compared with the more usual dual runways in use. Lots of delays and cancellations.

JClasstraveller

Kiwi Flyer

Was in effect by 8am. I guess your flight was earlier than that?

JClasstraveller

Yes it was before 8am