CLE-DEN-SAN
 

Attempt to leave Cleveland yesterday, Monday. First, the plane was having a mechanical which they fixed, and we attempted to leave 30 mins late. Then, we waited on the tarmac to take off for almost an hour. At that time, the pilot was denied clearance for the West. The plane was to be re-routed, however, since it had spent so much time waiting for take off, it didn't have enough fuel. So, back to the gate for refueling, and then back for take off!
The folks at United were very nice however, and we were all re-routed on the next flight out of Denver prior to arriving there. All in all, we got in only 2 hours late!

Ricechex, we were on the same flight! UA435, a 737-300, right? I was in 4A.

My story didn't end there, and I'll be filing a trip report tonight.

I was listening to channel 9 the whole time. There were all kinds of activity going on, military T-45s going to the air show, a Continental 737 on an emergency landing (don't know the problem, but safe landing), and a bunch of "little guys" (our pilots referred to Cessna Citations) waiting to depart.

Indurain, interested to hear about the rest of your trip. I was in 9E, a center seat, in between 2 big guys. None of us were too happy. What was interesting, was that the flight next door to us, was leaving at 4:30 PM (my parents were on that one) on the way to Chicago. When we came back to the gate for refueling, I noticed their plane was gone, which means they must have made it before the clearance restriction went into place! We must have missed the clearance by just a few minutes!
This was good for them though, because they were scheduled to arrive in SJO almost 3 hours after myself. Its about the same flying time, so my thought is, best NOT to fly through Chicago!

I also considered going through ORD when the oil leak was discovered on our flight, but decided to stick to it because of all I've heard about ORD delays. Doh...

My girlfriend was on a WN flight that left at 4:55, and they took off as we were taxiing back for fuel.

I was a bit confused because while the captain said we were number one for departure at the time, tower told the aircraft AHEAD of us that they can't leave because ATC shut down flights to the west, and said it applied to all others waiting. We called ground for re-routing, got it, but it took UA dispatch too long to get back, so we were sent to the end of the line, at which point we used up too much fuel.

Did you happen to hang out at the RCC before the flight? Did I meet you and not know it?

Interesting, well at least we made it home on the same day. No, I wasn't in the RCC, however, you may have seen me standing at the desk at the gate to check on re-routing. I hung out there to see what would occur after they told us about the oil leak. My experience has been when this sort of thing occurs, best get on it right away, as first come first serves when flights are filled!

See, those FlyerTalk pins would come in handy in a situation like this...

There are pins?! I didn't know there are pins!

While I was hanging out at the RCCs, I did look around trying to guess how many of the other travelers are fellow FT'ers...

Some of you need to send your picture to NJDavid so he can post them on his site. I have id'd a few fellow flyertalker's this way.