chrisphx

I am flying my father up to my sister's wedding, with the first flight originating from SPI (Springfield, IL) through ORD. For years, flights routinely get cancelled, and the rumors are always that they cancel flights if they are not full enough. Last year, they ran four flights a day from SPI to ORD, but they cut it back to three per day this year.

Shortly after Christmas 2010, my flight got "cancelled," leaving me stuck an extra day. This impacted two people's international flights. But now it's causing my father to miss a day with our entire family before my sister's wedding.

They say it's due to air traffic control cancelling because of weather. However, the flight is not scheduled to leave for quite a while, and there is only a 10% chance of rain up in O'Hare. It's not raining now, and the winds are light. I have a feeling that this is an excuse. The site that I used in the past to track open seats has been closed for a while. Can anyone see how many open seats are on UA 6812?

What rights, if any, do we have to pursue this and determine if UA is creating their own cancellation due to an empty flight, if this truly is the case? This has reportedly been going on for years, and they should not mess with people's families like this. Thanks in advance for your help. I'm very upset by this. My father is not a good traveler, and this will really hurt the cause.

cl.lurker

(bolding mine)

...unless you have factual evidence, it's a tough one. Plus, flights have been quite full lately, so the argument of empty flights won't stick, IMHO....

Have you tried calling UA and rescheduling the flight?

mintirish

I regularly fly SBN to ORD and experience the same type of issues. The drive from South Bend to Ohare is 2-2.5 hours so I am always ready to hop in the car and drive and call United on the way to get some later flights.

Would the same option be available to you now? I know it is a PITA, but to get to the wedding in the shortest time possible it may be worth it.

chrisphx

I agree with the post about flights being full all the time...I see it every week. Springfield is a strange market, though, dependent on when the legislature is in session. My father is intimidated by driving in Chicago and won't do it alone, so there's no way he would drive through there. He is already confirmed on the first flight out tomorrow morning.

The gate agent with whom I spoke last Christmas said that they typically do not cancel the first or last flight out of town unless there are actual weather issues. I should have booked him at 6am.

jhayes_1780

The flight is today? If so... your mudding things up with the Christmas story.

Anyway, if it is today.... From the FAA:

And when Traffic Management Programs are put into place, the 1st victims are RJ's.

IMhO, UA/UX is off the hook on this one.

chrisphx

Thanks so much for the official report. I actually feel better that this is legit. I can't wait until they get the extra runway capacity at O'Hare. It will prevent a lot of problems.

cordelli

According to the faa page

Due to WEATHER / LOW CEILINGS, there is a Traffic Management Program in effect for traffic arriving Chicago OHare International Airport, Chicago, IL (ORD). This is causing some arriving flights to be delayed an average of 2 hours and 3 minutes. To see if you may be affected, select your departure airport and check "Delays by Destination".

and if you look at the information for Springfield

Due to WEATHER / LOW CEILINGS, departure traffic destined to Chicago OHare International Airport, Chicago, IL (ORD) is currently experiencing delays averaging 2 hours and 3 minutes.

Remember that's an average, one flight can be delayed an hour, and the next one three hours to average out to two hours.

As the airlines have to report cancellations to the government on a monthly basis, I would tend to believe they are not just making up data and saying it's weather related. They may cancel a flight for a number of reasons, but I don't think they would blame the FAA and / or weather unless it was actually weather.

In this case, where the delay hours long on a flight under an hour, I would bet it's weather/faa related.

jhayes_1780

Where is the wedding, maybe we can help Doesn't AA have flights to DFW out of SPI?

weirdlyndon

Airlines will rarely cancel a flight because it's not full enough. Odds are that aircraft needs to operate the flight whether full or not because its next flight could be extremely full and profitable. I was on a MR last month where my JFK-SFO flight had a whopping 15 people on board across all cabins. Clearly they lost major money on this flight, but the same aircraft then operated a SFO-JFK flight that was oversold in C and Y, so...

fastair

ORD capacity is about 110-120 flights landing per hour. When the FAA/ATC have reduced visability, they reduce that number. Lets say they allow 75/hr. The xtra 35 get delayed, if they anticipate the weather becoming perfect soon. This rarely happens...the next hour, lets say the wx is the same. 75/hr allowed to land. now you got 75, plus 35 that aren't allowed to land, plus the 35 from the previous hour. Now lets say that the wx improves a bit. They let 85 land. Well, they got the 85, plus the previous 70 delayed, and 25 more. That's 95 extra landings that still have yet to be accomodated. Guess what...flights get cncld as there is no way to make up for the extra capacity coming in.

This is how a flow control program works. Inbound planes get delayed at their upline stations, if only a moderate program, with only a few cncls. A more severe program or a long (many hours) cuases long delays and numerous cncls.

colonius

http://www.united.com/link/0,7081,52...+notices&pos=1

If they have a waiver notice in place, conditions at ORD are expected to be truely bad... to the OP: you have many options now if the flight was today: different route, refund and buy a ticket elsewhere, etc...

SFOSpiff

I've only flown a small number of domestic flights since Jan and this is now the second time that the one day and specific city I've been flying to has been affected by a weather waiver. My bad weather curse is getting stronger.

I'm thinking of starting a business where people pay me not to go to Hawaii, the Caribbean, etc.

btw, these waivers typically do not allow a full refund, unless the flight is actually canceled.

MSPGabe

Just a data point, last summer there were 3 or 4 days where we BEGGED for a flight to cancel...

On Sundays in the summer, PWM has a 1900 and 2000 flight to ORD, both on CR7s. The 2nd ORD flight is usually only filled to 10 or so people. There were two occasions last year where we got everyone on the earlier flight because the 2000 was late. That left the 2000 flight with ZERO passengers, and they wouldn't cancel it. (And for the record, the inbound only had 15 people. And it arrived 4 hours late.)

UnitedF1RST

I had to end up doing this just a few days ago but ended up getting to ORD 8 minutes past the baggage cut off time. The UX flights almost always go first when there is a flow control pattern.

azepine00

Out of curiosity, how easy is it to misrepresent the reason for delay/cancellation? Would smth like this trigger severe penalties from the FAA if uncovered?