I've never had a whole vacation go bad before that I can remember, but dear god, the plane flight to Puerto Rico 4 or so years back? I doubt I'll ever forget it.
So it started out that our longer flight out of Texas and into San Juan was delayed maybe 2 hours, which honestly wasn't so bad. It gave us time to eat lunch, my dad took a nap, and I got some nice Pokemon training done in that time as we awaited them opening boarding. However, not more than 10 minutes before they were to line us up, they announced the plane needed a new part put on it before it was safe to fly. Only one problem with doing that...
The nearest mechanic capable of installing said part in the time they had was a 3 hour flight away.
Obviously flying on a plane needing work would've been unsafe, so they informed us we'd be further delayed and gave out some silly food passes for compensation. Additionally, there were no other flights to San Juan that day, so anyone on their way over there had no choice but to just wait for this as it still was the soonest flight. Well after the four or so hours, they finally let us board the plane as the mechanic wrapped up his work to let us fly.
The mechanic, being his professional self, informed us the particular part did not seem to be fitting right or was otherwise making him concerned about the safety of flying. Now obviously we didn't want to fly on the plane if it wasn't safe, and the flight crew was on the same page. But of course, the issues couldn't end there. Oh no!
As it turns out, this particular airline's regulations put us in a tricky spot. We couldn't be on any aircraft without a crew also aboard, but this crew was also the only one available and thus we couldn't be moved to another plane so easily since they still needed to be able to put away this plane for maintenance. They also couldn't let us back into the airport, as our passes were already taken and they'd have no way to verify us all being the right people to get on the plane.
Rather, they did something they were trained to do, but had never seen actually used in at least 20 years of working for the airline. They pushed some stairs up to the plane, lined us up on the tarmac, and walked us across to another plane as half the crew moved ahead to board the plane, the other half staying with us to be sure we headed the right way. All the while, staff and crew members snapped pictures on their phones, since as they had informed us they'd never seen this actually put into practice in their years working for various airlines.
In the end, after nearly 7 hours delay, we managed to be on our way with our flight and every passenger accounted for. But yea, a wild ass story that I hope those of you who read enjoyed or found at least a little interesting. *_*
