darthbimmer

While delays usually don't get pulled back in, it does happen often enough that it's not worth gambling on not being at the airport and near the gate. If the weather changes, or the ground stop lifts, or operations swaps in a different aircraft, it's on you if you're not there.

dash1729

My experience has been that a delay almost always means a delay--although sometimes a bit shorter than originally forecast. I've never--and I fly a lot--had the experience that some others have reported where they announce a long delay and then suddenly they find a new plane at the last minute and the flight leaves on time.

What sometimes happens is that initially they don't really have much information about how long the delay will be so they will announce delays in (e.g.) one hour increments because they don't know much. So a flight scheduled for 1pm might be announced as delayed until 2pm and then 3pm. Then more accurate information becomes available and the flight leaves at 2:35pm.

It takes quite a bit of time to board a flight. So you need to be in the airport and in the secure area but you don't really need to be right at the gate. Even if the delay does get moved back up a bit, it is physically impossible for a flight to change from delayed to the gate closed in 5 or 10 minutes. It takes quite a bit longer than that to board the aircraft. There is time to get to the aircraft from anywhere in the secure part of the terminal once they announce the flight.

dash1729

I've never personally encountered this, but I'm wondering when it does happen how checking of luggage works. Airlines generally won't accept checked luggage more than 4 hours before the departure time, and I've had airlines use the delayed expected time, rather than the scheduled time, as their basis for refusing bags more than 4 hours in advance.

So if a 4 hour delay instantly morphed into no delay at all it could be very difficult for people to check their bags.

televisor

A 4 hour delay is unlikely to morph into 0 delay, more like 3 hours or at best 2 hours - I don't see a 4 hour delay being announced unless the airline is quite sure they won't have anything available close to scheduled departure.

That said even then I don't see it as likely that agents would refuse checkin at most airports. Especially given that checkin opening time varies by country and airline: e.g. SQ in Changi claim 48 hours (at the other end of the spectrum I know LCY has a blanket 2 hours for all airlines, but that's a small enough airport that the times don't matter too much if a flight gets moved forward).

Tchiowa

Quite often, from my experience. It's not just going back to the original time but moving it part way and you're just late enough to miss the flight. Happened to me once (on Delta at JFK).

darthbimmer

It's rare but it definitely happens. My one personal experience with it came after flying well more than 1 million miles. UA IAH-SFO was delayed because the assigned aircraft flying ORD-IAH went mechanical at ORD. Delays went from 1 hour to 2 hours to 3 hours as the plane was being repaired. Then suddenly I received a text alert that the flight would leave on time. UA Operations had reassigned an aircraft of the same type from another route to ours.

Qwkynuf

Almost missed my flight home from San Diego late last year. Got to the airport on time, checked my bag, went through security, no problem.

Went to my gate, display said that departure was delayed for an hour so I went and found a restaurant to get some dinner. Wandered back to the gate right around the original departure time, and everyone except me was boarded. 5 more minutes and I would have been looking at a closed door.

They never did tell me why they changed it back.

moondog

In China, it's now common for airlines to announce updated departure times via SMS/email. When this happens, the new departure time becomes official, and check-in deadlines are adjusted accordingly. I'm quite pleased with this system myself.

Gregory Nelson

It's happened to me - but only once out of many, many delays.

I had a Delta flight DFW-MSP. On the way to the airport, received a text & e-mail updating the departure time to something like 2.5 hours later. So, trying to make lemons out of lemonade, we stopped off at a steakhouse near the airport, with visions of a nice, relaxed pre-departure meal.

Right as we got our food, got a updated departure time that was now only 30 minutes late. We wolfed down our steaks and bolted out of the restaurant.

That ended up being just an annoyance. But I would have been in a world of hurt if I had had chosen to sit at home for those 2.5 hours instead of hanging near the airport. IMO, once you commit to a new time, subsequent pre-poning, especially by a couple of hours, is bad form.

(FWIW, I assume we got an equipment swap for one of their DFW-ATL planes, since we ended up on a regular plane, not one of the RJs Delta usually runs on DFW-MSP.)

mglvrug

I had a related experience today that made me chuckle. My AA flight out of DCA today was delayed. The flight is scheduled to depart at 1:42, but a number of us got text messages while waiting on the bus to go out to the aircraft telling us that we would now depart at 1:52.

Then, a few minutes later, I got this email, apparently claiming that since we were were not going to depart 8 minutes late at 1:50 but 10 minutes late at the previously announced (delayed) time of 1:52, the flight was therefore "on time":

"Your flight is now on time. American Eagle flight 4053 from Washington Reagan to Pittsburgh on Monday, August 15, 2016 at 1:50 PM has changed. The flight is now back to its original time of departure at 1:52 PM."

In fact, aa.com acknowledges the flight actually left at 2:00.

Proudelitist

Honestly, it's never happened to me in 30 years of flying, the last 15 years at least two per week.

But that said, it's just me. I know it CAN happen so I always stick around.

jeebus

I'm surprised some have said this happens often -- I've encountered it perhaps once or twice at most. Apart from anecdotal data, it would be interesting to see if anyone has any hard data on this.

MrTemporal

That's happened to me twice in the past four years. A flight gets delayed for an hour or more. People tend to scatter. Then an announcement is heard "Ogosh Airlines flight 352 has found a substitute crew. All passengers return to the gate for immediate on-time departure."

purch

My father in law missed his IAD-JNB flight yesterday, for this reason if I understand correctly.

Details are a bit sketchy but if I understand, the airport monitors showed a delay, so he stayed in the lounge. After noticing the lounge became quite empty, he went to the gate to find the flight was long gone, even though the monitors were apparently still showing a delay. But as I said, the details are still very sketchy. Either the flight time was reverted to its original time, or the monitors didn't work properly.

Not sure why they couldn't ring the lounge to see if any passengers were still there. I assume that would have been quicker than to page a few times, then waste minimum 20 mins offloading his bags...

Moral of the story - maybe it's better to stay nearby and keep checking at the gate periodically...

MSPeconomist

When flights are delayed, it's good practice to ask the lounge agents whether they will monitor the situation and announce any changes. Some lounges will do this and others not, but it's ultimately your responsibility to watch what's happening.

At some outstations, if you watch incoming flights you know that there's no aircraft available. [This can be true at small airports, for example ITH is served on DL by three CRJ-200s per day and if the inbound flight is sitting on the tarmac at DTW, it won't be leaving ITH very soon. It can also happen at large international airports, for example DL service to/from SIN, where if you know that NRT-SIN will be eight hours late, from about 1 am to 9 am arrival, you can feel certain that SIN-NRT will not leave at 5-6 am either, although even in this example something strange can happen when aircraft are coming and going from heavy maintenance at SIN, where I once saw two PMNW A330s parked side by side.] Similarly, if the delay is due to crew rest, in most cases, it's unlikely that a new crew can/will be flown in to move up your flight's departure time, although if you're at a hub or crew base, all kinds of switches are feasible.