final call at T-28 minutes
 

i had a 12:55pm flight today, MHT-CLT. at 12:27, i was eating lunch at the milltown grille, when i heard a final boarding call for my flight. please board immediately, if you're not on board 15 minutes prior to departure, your reservations are subject to cancellation. five minutes later, i (and about 8 other people) were paged by name. fortunately, the milltown grille was quick, and i made it to the gate around 12:38. i boarded, one person followed me, and the door closed at 12:40pm. we then took a very slow taxi and still had to sit until our wheels-up time at 13:01, and the flight still arrived over 20 minutes early.

this was all more annoying than having the flight 15 minutes late.. is this a common occurrence?

(on the bright side, i bypassed all of the lovely $10 "choice" seats in favor of a free seat in the exit row.. :-) )

The folks at MHT are extremely proactive in their operations, they run a tight ship and have worked miracles for me several times. Maybe they thought Charlotte was about to get an arrival delay program started up and wanted to get the plane out ahead of it. Maybe they needed to free up the gate for an inbound flight? Whatever their reason was, I'm sure it was good.

You're supposed to be at the gate 20 mins before departure. Were you not cutting things a tad fine by being in the middle of your lunch 28 minutes before departure!!! ?