Ever go to the wrong airport?
 

I've just been traveling and traveling, living in hotels the past month.

About Wednesday, I realized I needed a room at the airport on Friday night so I could get up and take my BA flight to AMS Saturday (today). LHR Hilton.

I couldn't check into the kiosk and the queues were the worst I've ever seen. They snaked through tents outside and I have no status -- even the Club and First queues were tremendous, so it wouldn't have helped too much.

So I called my wife, cause the kiosk asked for a flight number. And even though it was 2AM, she looked on my computer and found the reservation. 9:30AM....from LGW.

Oh. My. God.

The rebooking queue was about 3 hours long (floods in England and 10 percent of yesterday's flights canceled) so I decided to swallow my pride and buy a new ticket on NW/KLM, where I am PLT.

$600.

On Expedia, my wife found a Lufthansa flight for $174. Better. In the end, I swallow my pride and tapped my endless supply of NW miles for an award ticket. Taxes cost me about $80.

So, I stayed calm, made some phone calls, and am out only about 8 hours and $80. I went back to the Hilton and had breakfast and started reading the new Harry Potter book.

Could be worse.

Anyone else do this -- go to the wrong airport? I can guarantee I'll be more careful in the future.

Never done it.

Woken up at the middle of the night and wondered where I am? Quite a few times!

I was staying on Paradise Island once and on the way to the airport (Nassau) some others on the bus mentioned it was taking a long time to get there. Fortunately the driver heard this and stopped asking them which airport and they replied the one on Paradise Island. I didn't know there was an alternate airport so it could have easily been me going in the wrong direction.

Done it once. Who knew Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia has two airports? BKI is the one that pops up when you google it. There's another one, which we ended up at. Luckily, we left early for the trip to the airport, and just hopped a cab to BKI.

I'm more afraid of ending up in the wrong city, since it's a different city every week for me.

I get the feeling every time I make the trek to Heathrow.

Never done it as well.

I get the same feeling about LHR like you even though I don't reside in London but make frequent trips there.

A couple of weeks ago while walking in CMH (Columbus, Ohio) I heard a lady on her cell phone say "I was supposed to be in Columbus, Georgia, and you all booked me to Columbus, Ohio!"

Never gone to the wrong airport but went to the wrong counter last week. I went to the UA Kiosk and it gave me some non-sense flight numbers. Then I realized I was supposed to be on AA for that segment.

I showed up at the wrong Barcelona train station during my Spain trip. Went to Este Station where I arrived into Barcelona from Granada, couldn't find my train. The desk person said, "you are supposed to be at Franco station" and I thought, "What?! there's two stations in Barcelona?" Hopped on a taxi and rushed over. I'm glad I got to the train station early enough to compensate for that huge near mistake (Barcelona to Paris overnight sleeper not cheap).

When I was working in New York, I'd sometimes fly into LGA, other times EWR. One time, I thought I was flying from LGA, went to the airport only to find out that I was flying from EWR. Since the flight was uber-delayed (sidebar - do flights to Chicago from NYC ever leave on time??) I just hopped in a cab and went over there. En route to the airport, my late flight became a canceled flight! I read my BPs a lot more carefully after that event... :)

As an undergrad living in Seville, Spain, I hopped a flight during Christmas Break (this is important) from SVQ to the Canary Islands. I got off at Gran Canaria, not realizing I should have waited to deplane in Tenerife. After waiting for two hours and no luggage, I checked with a CSR who helped me try and locate my baggage, then telling me I had landed on the wrong island. I booked a puddle-jumper to Tenerife for around $80, then was relieved to finally set down where I was supposed to go.

Unfortunately, Tenerife has two airports, and I landed at Tenerife North (TFN). I ran into the same issue in that my original flight landed at Tenerife South. Being a Christmas Holiday, almost all public transport was unavailable, so I was stuck with a $80 taxi bill to get my luggage at TFS. The driver was nice enough to help me find a cheap place to stay, but after check in, I only had $9 for eight days. I was able to survive on bread and water during that break, spending my days and evenings on the beach.

I did have an awesome, awesome tan.

:D

I showed up at SFO once when my flight was out of SJC. Didn't turn out to be a problem - they rebooked me and didn't even charge me for it. I suppose showing up at a UA hub instead of the non-hub is quite a bit better than the other way around - there were lots of options for me at SFO.

I've never gone to the wrong airport, but I have also woken up in the middle of the night, not knowing which town I was in!

Never the wrong airport but I can report the same waking up not knowing where I am as others ...and now that includes at home too!

But I am mostly famous for showing up at the airport on the WRONG DAY! either by looking at the arrival date - i mostly travel internationally- or because i am a ding-a-ling. Geez. First time agent said Sir your flight left yesterday - and I laughed at what I thought was a bad joke. She was right tho! Next two times weren't as funny....................................

Me, either. I am never done wrong airport before. I have flying right cities where I am go there from original cities. I am always flying all of the times. I don't have a specifics problems entire airports.

sure...went to DCA instead of IAD in the Washington DC area. Silly me...

At the old ATH airport, they had 2 terminals - I think it was one for OA and the other for everyone else. The taxi dropped me off at the wrong one so I had to take another cab to the other terminal.

But didn't you save whatever it would have cost to go from LHR to LGW? :D

No, but somebody tried to direct me to the wrong airport once.

I was in Taipei about 22 years ago, back in the days when you had to confirm your onward flight or lose it. I missed the deadline for confirming my Sunday flight, lost the seat, and was told that my choices were either Tuesday (in which case I would miss an appointment in Tokyo) or that very day, Saturday...in about four hours.

I hurriedly threw my things into my suitcase and started to walk the two or three blocks to the bus station where the airport bus had dropped me off a few days earlier.

As I came out of the hotel, a young man I had been talking to the previous evening spotted me and offered to carry my suitcase (this was in the days before roll-aboards). He then took off in the wrong direction, insisting that the airport bus left from somewhere else, because he had taken a flight to Tokyo three years before, and that's how he'd made the journey.

Basically, with the best of intentions, he was doing his damnedest to get me to the OLD airport on time. I kept trying to tell him that I needed to go to the NEW airport, but he was tuning out English. "No, airport bus this way!" Finally, I mustered my pidgin Chinese and begged him to ask someone.

My broken Chinese got through to him, because he stopped and asked the nearest policeman for directions. He then sheepishly admitted that I was right. I needed to go to the bus station that had buses for the new airport, about four blocks out of our way now.

Well, there was nothing to do but change direction. Between the extra walk and the ticket line, I just barely made it onto the last bus that would take me to my flight in a reasonable time.

Sometimes people can mess things up with their kindness.

Hey, that happens. My English uncle flew into IAD from the UK, did his business, then continued on to visit his sister in Maine. He presented himself at the UA counter at DCA for his PWM flight, under the reasonable assumption that short-haul flights would be leaving from the small airport, while only long-haul flights would be leaving from the big airport out in the middle of nowhere. He was set straight and put on a bus to IAD. Missed his flight.

I should have gone to DCA and showed up at IAD in 1998 about 1.5 hours before a flight to JFK on a puddle jumper which was connecting to an SQ flight that night. Tried to change to an IAD-JFK which was overbooked by 3 on a puddle jumper, so agent said no chance, better sprint to DCA, which was at least 45 mins away.

Got a cab and hightailed it to DCA, made it 30 mins before takeoff, bags didn't make it on the flight, but I ran into the gate just as they were about to close...

In TPE once when I was young, I entered a taxi and said "Airport." This was my first time to the island. So I got dropped off and couldn't find the NW ticket counters. I went and asked a person that worked there and I was shocked to find out that TSA and TPE are two different airports. I mean this was WAY BACK.

And the shocking thing was, NO ONE EVER TOLD ME. This was like one of those things I guess you assume people know.

It also didn't help matters that I had reached the island through KHH, so I had NEVER landed in TPE ever, which would've saved me all this trouble.

It can easily happen in Manila. Until about one and a half years ago, all domestic flights were departing from the so called "Domestic Airport". Then suddenly, Air Philippines moved to the PAL Centennial Terminal. From then on, Centennial was an airport for domestic AND International flights for Philippine Airlines only or Air Philippines. There is still NAIA for all other international airlines. In the beginning, it was very confusing. Many people knew they had a domestic flight, but never really checked with which airline. The taxi drivers did know nothing, as usual in Manila.
We are working together with an agent in Manila who informed us about the change, so it never happened to me, but so many people went to the domestic airport, but had an Air Philippines ticket. Domestic airport is now only for Cebu Pacific, Asian Spirit and some minor small domestic carriers.
The good thing is, these two Terminals are not far away from eachother, and if you look at the airport in Manila, you realize, that in the end, all is one. Still wondering why they can not arrange a decent way of transportation between NAIA, Centennial and Domestic, as the runways are all the same. We always joke that the cab-drivers-lobby is against it ;)

I was running late to RSW in February and relying on directions from the Avis where2. I passed a highway exit marked for the airport on advise of the Garmin unit, thinking the rental car return must have been off-site. Turns out the unit took me to the abandoned site where the Ft Myers airport used to be. I hustled back to the highway and barely made my flight.

This has occured quite often according to stories told by one of my Taiwanese friend. He said some cab drivers there do get confused if the passenger does not specify by fare (it cost alot more to go to the interantional one than the domestic one by virtue of distance from city center) or by specific location (Sungshan vs. Taoyuan).

Or in the likes of LAX to SNA vv.

Did it once, 15 years ago. Was working a booth for PC Expo at the Javits Center in NYC with a group a few others from the company we worked for. We all flew from Seattle to LaGuardia together but I had to come back a day earlier than they did.

The morning of the flight, I was relaxed, had plenty of time, and sat peacefully in the cab on the way back to LaGuardia to catch my flight. When I got in the terminal, I looked at the monitor and my UA flight was nowhere to be found. Only at this point did I look at my return ticket to find I was catching a flight out of JFK, in one hour. Ran outside, hailed a taxi, told him my plight, and he laughed and told me he couldn't promise we'll make it on time. But he drove quickly, there was very little traffic, I ran through the terminal (thank goodness security wasn't what it is today), and was the last person on. I was seated maybe for a minute or 2 before we taxied.

I was at JFK with my family 2 weeks ago, the first time since this experience, and reminisced about it with them. We all had a good laugh.

So that explains my adventure (post #19).

I've done it when picking people up.

My brother was flying back to San Fran area. He always flew into OAK. I thought I confirmed it was OAK.

He called me up and asked "hey.. where are you?" I said I was shooting down Hegenberger Rd in oakland... "uhhh.. I'm at SFO"

Luckily it was fairly late so I could just shoot over the Bridge just south of SFO (I wanna say Dunbarton but I can't remember) and just head up that way.

In 25 years of frequent flying, I've done it once and boarded the wrong airplane once.

My flight was at the next gate but they took my ticket and let me in by mistake.

Another time, I used to fly from FLL mostly but :o booked a ticket from MIA. They rebooked me for the next flight leaving from MIA.

20 years ago or so, I was supposed to fly yyz to yvr on a particular day. At the time, you could check in at the car rental or parking lot at yyz, I don't remember which. Anyway, the guy 'checked me in' on for the flight the next day! I was sitting on the plane when another pax told me I was in her seat. I pulled out my BP and showed her this was my assigned seat... It was the FA who pointed out that I was checked in for the wrong day and I was removed from the plane! It was fully booked no available seats. After going to tktg, they rebooked me for a later flight that night but what a pain!

What's more amazing is that I made it that far! Nobody caught it at any point along the way (including me :rolleyes:)

DD

Once: I flew into ORD as the last stop of a trip and was supposed to fly out of MDW. I went back to ORD and got all the way to the gate (no one said a word :eek:). Luckily they rebooked me and I was on my way home. ^

The first time I flew the corporate shuttle into St Louis, I made sure that I had a car waiting for me upon arrival. Imagine my surprise when we didn't land at STL, but across town at ALN (St Louis Regional). Not exactly a ton of taxis waiting there, either!

I've gotten to the correct airport 12 hours early. :eek: I misread 10:00 PM as 10:00 AM. Unfortunately, I had Mrs BamaVol and 2 kids with me so it's not just a secret between me and FT. The saddest part is we stayed at an airport Hilton the night before so we'd be sure to get a good nights sleep and get to the airport on time.

I've also landed at the wrong airport. Our travel website always offers lower cost alternatives and you have to be careful that it doesn't switch airports. I wasn't careful and let it switch my arrival to the wrong Houston airport. When I landed I called my boss and told him I would meet him at the Air Tran luggage carousels. His reponse was unprintable.

I once took a flight from LHR to BRU (where I lived), forgetting that I had started my journey in FRA (where I worked). Wandered around the parking garage at BRU for thirty minutes before realizing that the ticket was in German ...

Well to make everyone feel better the pro's do this too!
http://www.thirdamendment.com/wrongway.html

never the wrong airport, but once the wrong hotel. fortunately, the times square marriott marquis and renaissance are quite close. i did recently (on personal travel) leave my wallet at home. with 1.45 before my flight, drove from ATL to my home in alpharetta (37 miles away) and back with time to spare, thanks to a 30 minute delay. i've also arrived at the airport a day early.

Haven't gone to the wrong airport but have gone at the wrong time a couple of times. Just yesterday I arrived at LAX thinking my flight to JFK was at noon. Oops, it was at 11am. Luckily, I had gotten there early and there were no security lines. Plus my upgrade cleared. altogether good

I did the same thing another time flying from CMH - ATL

Both times I lucked out. I need to read my flight schedules more closely!:o

Love it^

Flew out of PDX general aviation a few times on a clients plane ^. Well, he got himself a better deal (and closer to home) at HIO (Hillsboro, OR). He forgot to tell us :td:. He waited 45 minutes for us to redeploy.