My ORD-YQR flight was held up because of late inbound passengers from MCO. A rebooking changed a 2-hour connection to 50 minutes, and we were 15 minutes late arriving atop that. As it turns, 37 of the 50 booked passengers on ORD-YQR were on that MCO-ORD flight.

I should point out that I and the other six people in my party were in our seats on the RJ 15 minutes prior to scheduled departure. If I'd known 30 others were taking their time I could have a slightly more restful walk to Terminal 2. :)

(I should point out that this was a roughly 5:30 pm departure, and the only flight of the day to YQR. Failure to make this flight would require UA to put up the passengers overnight and route them via DEN, or send them on the next day's YQR run.)

You probably just didn't see the GA. An airline representative must be monitoring the jetway door as long as it's opened with access to the aircraft or they can get STEEP penalties from the FAA. A GA can't just open the aircraft door, then the jetway door to let pax into the terminal and then bounce.

Three gate agent Whoppers all in a row!
 

About a year ago my flight from Chicago to Tulsa was cancelled due to mechanical problems and a small group of more astute travelers took off at a run for the distant customer service counter. After a lengthy wait, I approached the agent and was told there were 31 seats left on the late flight to Tulsa and that I would be guaranteed a seat. To my left, another agent was telling a young couple flying to Tulsa that there were no more available seats and they would have to stay overnight and fly out at 4:00 PM the next day. To my right the agent was telling a young man in the military that he would have to wait until 8:30 AM for a flight to Tulsa. When all was said and done, I didn't get to fly out that night as the agent didn't actually book me on the flight but put me on standby!....and I was First Class - Premier Gold!.

Sounds to me like you've got airline passeger tunnel vision syndrome.

There is always an agent. They are either down in the jetway assisting with gatechecks (on express flights) or standing behind the podium/counter up top. An open jetway cannot be left unattended.

On an SFO - IAD flight in March, the GA said the overheads were all full and made us gate check our rollons.

When we got to our seats, the bin above them was completely empty.

This one's not so much a whopper, but a ...:

Several years ago (Pre-(9/11) when I was still doing international, I was on a UA flight Chicago-Munich. After leaving the gate and taxing out to the runway, the pilot came on the intercome to state they were having an issue with the landing gear and needed to taxi back. A passenger a few rows forward of me hit the call button and had the FA come over. After discussing for a few minutes, he got up and went to the cockpit in the cockpit with the FA. The pilot then came over the intercome that "We're in luck! We have a United Mechanic onboard today." After about 10 minutes, the passenger came back, got in their seat and we took off.

Of course, I'm thinking "The pilot said the issue was with the landing gear. If the mechanic didn't leave the plane, how'd he fix the landing gear?"

PEBCAK related issue.

1) Boarded our plane on time. 5 minutes after scheduled to depart instructed to deplane due to mechanical. Flight officially delayed (and then cancelled) due to "late arriving aircraft"

2) Red eye SFO->JFK. Boarded on time. 5 minutes after SFO->EWR left, purser announced to passengers that they didn't have a pilot as the scheduled pilot had jury duty the following day. They were searching for a replacement.

Sorry, not a "whopper." This is standard operating procedure with many of the GA today.

First post! Welcome to flyertalk!

Last year on flight from Chicago to LGA, bad storms so plane parked on runway. Sit out there for good 1 hour. Pilot comes on and says they need additional fuel so going back to gate. So we taxi back to gate and then pilot announces that they were sorry but told that they were going to cancel the flight.

I'm guessing pilots were running out of room in terms of flight time but just guessing.

A whopper all the same.

Looks like they've been profitable for two years:

http://img577.imageshack.us/img577/9576/ual.png

That one shocked me too. 18 segments in the last several weeks and gate matched boarding passes, even those printed 24 hours earlier.

I've had the electronics sensor line on my last trip where crew turned it to a bigger joke about certain devices being much better than others. Its not a total outright lie though. Its not too hard for an observant FA walking up the aisle to count the number of devices they see in use. I've heard this on other carriers as well so its not just made up by UA/CO crew

Frankly, I think the biggest whopper of late is when we board an aircraft with the death star on the tail and Jeffy on the welcome video and get told that it is "United Airlines". I flew on United Airlines, and this ain't it!

This just reminded me of another huge whopper! It was a video when the merger began when Jeffy said, "There will be a lot of changes in the months ahead, that I think you're going to like."