Sequester And Flights...Anyone worried?

[jsilvers]

I just went and read the faa links someone posted and checked the list of air traffic control towers that may be closing and guess what.... the one here in Idaho that I leave from is on that list!!! What do I do if it closes!?!?!?

One the one hand, airports can and do operate without a tower.

On the other hand, many airlines as a matter of policy will not operate at an airport without a tower.

At this point, all one can do is keep a close eye on developments. Also note that even if sequestration does takes effect, furloughs of air traffic controllers won't happen until circa March 31, because 30-days notice needs to be given to employees.

 

[iheartmickey1111]

Changing my flights to go out of Salt Lake City instead of here in Idaho... much less stress! Problem solved...no more worrying!

As an interesting tidbit, I did find out that the airport I normally fly out of does not have anyone in the tower until 7am anyways, so the 6 am flights I normally take never have anyone anyways. If this trip didn't involve "picking up" my mom on the Denver layover, I wouldn't worry so much, but I just dont want to deal with the stress. If the actual airport closes (which is a possibility accoording to local news) then EVERYONE would be going to Salt Lake City instead, and then the chances of getting on the flight I want is slim to none...and if I can't get out of Salt Lake City, then I don't have any more options left.

Thanks for the links, advice and input everyone!!

 

[DizDaD7]

Changing my flights to go out of Salt Lake City instead of here in Idaho... much less stress! Problem solved...no more worrying!

As an interesting tidbit, I did find out that the airport I normally fly out of does not have anyone in the tower until 7am anyways, so the 6 am flights I normally take never have anyone anyways. If this trip didn't involve "picking up" my mom on the Denver layover, I wouldn't worry so much, but I just dont want to deal with the stress. If the actual airport closes (which is a possibility accoording to local news) then EVERYONE would be going to Salt Lake City instead, and then the chances of getting on the flight I want is slim to none...and if I can't get out of Salt Lake City, then I don't have any more options left.

Thanks for the links, advice and input everyone!!

No one in the TOWER....Wow How does that work?

 

[iheartmickey1111]

No one in the TOWER....Wow How does that work?

Hey be nice!

 

[N365PA]

Im one of those "No Ones" in the tower. We dont know anything official yet as to how it will affect us but we've been told to be prepared for 11-24 days of leave without pay. From what I've read, alot of the smaller facilities are preparing for complete closure for the duration (there is a list of airports on the FAA's website). What this means is flights will be slowed down, not completely stopped. Long story short, when there is no air traffic control at these smaller airports (most dont have any ATC at night anyways), airliners are just slowed down. With an operating tower lets say Waco, TX (pure example, not real numbers) could say accept 30 flights an hour. Without the tower, that may get cut down to 8-10. At larger facilties, we've been told to plan for "rolling" furloughs. So not everyone will be furloughed at the same time. So for example say we have 4 radar scopes where I work for a normal day. We may be only able to staff 3 because 1 or 2 controllers a shift will be on furlough. The rumors are saying im probably going to get 1 day off without pay every week or two instead of all back to back. (Id rather be back to back, I got a savings account, will have an AP, and parents who live near Disney hehe...much to my wife's chagrin lol) So in order to keep things safe, we slow down our flow rate, from say 100 airplanes an hour to 60. This way we dont have a controller who is overworked and could inadvertantly put someone in harms way.

As people said above, take everything (including what I said above) with a grain of salt. If youre flying through all this, please understand the potential ATC delays are for your safety. The last thing anyone of us wants is to be overwhelmed with airplanes and "forget" about 2 until its to late. My first and foremost agenda is safety. Orderly and expeditous traffic flow comes next.

Through it all, safety will still be our number 1 goal.

Clint
(and as a former gate agent, please be nice to them. They have little or no control over the delays!)

 

[iheartmickey1111]

Im one of those "No Ones" in the tower. We dont know anything official yet as to how it will affect us but we've been told to be prepared for 11-24 days of leave without pay. From what I've read, alot of the smaller facilities are preparing for complete closure for the duration (there is a list of airports on the FAA's website). What this means is flights will be slowed down, not completely stopped. Long story short, when there is no air traffic control at these smaller airports (most dont have any ATC at night anyways), airliners are just slowed down. With an operating tower lets say Waco, TX (pure example, not real numbers) could say accept 30 flights an hour. Without the tower, that may get cut down to 8-10. At larger facilties, we've been told to plan for "rolling" furloughs. So not everyone will be furloughed at the same time. So for example say we have 4 radar scopes where I work for a normal day. We may be only able to staff 3 because 1 or 2 controllers a shift will be on furlough. The rumors are saying im probably going to get 1 day off without pay every week or two instead of all back to back. (Id rather be back to back, I got a savings account, will have an AP, and parents who live near Disney hehe...much to my wife's chagrin lol) So in order to keep things safe, we slow down our flow rate, from say 100 airplanes an hour to 60. This way we dont have a controller who is overworked and could inadvertantly put someone in harms way.

As people said above, take everything (including what I said above) with a grain of salt. If youre flying through all this, please understand the potential ATC delays are for your safety. The last thing anyone of us wants is to be overwhelmed with airplanes and "forget" about 2 until its to late. My first and foremost agenda is safety. Orderly and expeditous traffic flow comes next.

Through it all, safety will still be our number 1 goal.

Clint
(and as a former gate agent, please be nice to them. They have little or no control over the delays!)

Hahaha! You are the one that just answered my crazy question about how they charge the flight changes!!! So, as you now know...I already changed the flight! I only had a 35 min layover or so anyway, so I couldn't afford to leave late! Thank you so much for your time and input and for explaining everything (in both posts) so clearly for me- I really appreciate it!

 

[maxiesmom]

The news this morning stated that even if the budget cuts happen, the budget that relates to all of this will still be greater than what it was last year. That this is just a huge scare tactic, and it seems to be working.

 

[Tinkerdreams]

A group of 8 of us are going on a cruise out of Miami but flying into Fort Lauderdale on April 13. Flight arrives at 11:40 a.m. If there are long delays, does anyone believe that the airlines may let passengers change their flights without penalty (similar to imclement weather)? I'm thinking more along the lines of leaving the day before and booking a hotel room for overnight.

This is our first cruise and if I had known better, I would have booked the day before in the first place!!

 

[LSchrow]

Im one of those "No Ones" in the tower. We dont know anything official yet as to how it will affect us but we've been told to be prepared for 11-24 days of leave without pay. Clint

alas, a furlough may have a devasting affect on many, including ourselves.
DH works for a contractor that trains ATCers (was laid off, with many others, from NYSE firms a few years back). less ATC hours, less/no hours for him. that is the mortgage pymt, so it will hurt

DB, who was an ATC for many years, luckily retired and works elsewhere.

too bad they couldn't cut the govt's entertainment, limos, dining, redecorating budgets instead.

 

[momofkids]

Well That link doesn't list MCO as one of the potential ones being affected....I'm guessin it's probably most of the airports that aren't the busiest???

We're also returning in Laguardia LGA in NYC too...None of those airports are on the list as of now either..

But 1 thing that I do have to say is, that I'm soo annoyed w/ Delta Airlines.

We used to fly Continental for hte most part but switched to JET Blue about 8 years ago...Jet Blue = the best IMHO

Well this upcoming trip I couldn't get good deals roughly at the7 month mark. So we ended up finding great deals for Delat if you sign up for AMEX. They also waived the baggae fees if you're a cardholder too.

Long story short: Originally we were supposed to leave LGA at 6:30 AM and arrive roughly 2 1/2 hrs later. Well 2 months went by & an Email was sent saying that flight was switched to 7:05...Not a huge deal but whatever.

Return flight from MCO 8 days later was originally set for 2:55 PM. once again E mail stating that they put us on a 4:05 pm. Then a month later from that they switched us to a 6:00 pm flight....At this point I was livid. We originally had 9th row seating Iand now we're in row 36... They said there's nothing they could do...I spoke w/ a supervisor only to have him say is the best they could do was put us in the preferred section but charge us 39.00 more a person..I was like How is that helping us... Well finally this past Monday they did it again!!! E mail this time changing it back to 6:55 PM....Needless to say I now was on the phone for a total 45 mins. this time, only to find that they did move me up to the 28th row (preferred) with no extra charge....But as we were about to hang up she stated , :
"Don't be surprised if you get another change between now n then." LoL I'm thinking why 4 times isn't enough??? My question is this. I've been flying for at least 35 years now, Has anyone ever had this or anything close to this happend, because I certainly haven't?

We flew United last November, and our flights were moved/canceled multiple times. I called after the changes, and they let me pick the flights I wanted as long as we kept the same airports/same airline. I explained that the new flights weren't working for us, and they let us change for free. I ended up with way better flights than I had originally booked. They didn't tell me that changing flights was an option; I had to ask.

 

[rwdavis2]

Okay...now I am FREAKING OUT!!! I just went and read the faa links someone posted and checked the list of air traffic control towers that may be closing and guess what.... the one here in Idaho that I leave from is on that list!!! What do I do if it closes!?!?!?

Relax. The stuff in the news is scare tactics by the government. CNN got the Secratary of Transportation to admit that their budget is larger than it was in 2008 with fewer flights to monitor. They are not going to instantly shut down airports if the sequester hits. If they do then it is a political move so they can blame the other side for it.

 

[Greysword]

Okay...now I am FREAKING OUT!!! I just went and read the faa links someone posted and checked the list of air traffic control towers that may be closing and guess what.... the one here in Idaho that I leave from is on that list!!! What do I do if it closes!?!?!?

LOL! You'll be fine. If you are connecting in DEN and have a 30 minute layover, I bet you're flying United (UA) versus Frontier or Southwest. If so, good luck for just flying UA

While UA has cleaned up their act quite a bit over the past few months, you may still have departure issues in DEN simply due to the airline integration problems. Also if your flight from SLC is delayed, it is likely the plane you're taking from DEN to MCO may also be delayed in arriving.

But 1 thing that I do have to say is, that I'm soo annoyed w/ Delta Airlines.

... "Don't be surprised if you get another change between now n then." LoL I'm thinking why 4 times isn't enough??? My question is this. I've been flying for at least 35 years now, Has anyone ever had this or anything close to this happend, because I certainly haven't?

Delta is notorious for changing aircraft more than once as the schedules are amended as the departure date gets closer. With DL, I generally keep an eye on the reservation either through DL.com or better yet via a tracking site like TripIt. Award Wallet was the BEST, but DL killed their interaction via the website.

Bottom line, you want to know about the change before an email is sent, since these are slow to be delivered. If you watch it yourself, then you'll be positioned to grab the seats yourself once the system rearranges everyone.

The good news is that DL has the best in-flight customer service out of all the legacy airlines, IMO. Also if you have a problem, the @deltaassist twitter is the fastest and most responsive way to communicate with the airline. https://twitter.com/DeltaAssist Frequent Fliers like this option over their elite call reps many times.

In addition, if your schedule changes by an hour of more, DL is excellent at allowing you to change your flights to whatever flight you want as long as the origination and departure cities are the same. Thus if the flight you really wanted was too expensive, they will allow you to get on this one for free (pending availability).

 

[sam_gordon]

Well That link doesn't list MCO as one of the potential ones being affected....I'm guessin it's probably most of the airports that aren't the busiest???

We're also returning in Laguardia LGA in NYC too...None of those airports are on the list as of now either..

But 1 thing that I do have to say is, that I'm soo annoyed w/ Delta Airlines.

We used to fly Continental for hte most part but switched to JET Blue about 8 years ago...Jet Blue = the best IMHO

Well this upcoming trip I couldn't get good deals roughly at the7 month mark. So we ended up finding great deals for Delat if you sign up for AMEX. They also waived the baggae fees if you're a cardholder too.

Long story short: Originally we were supposed to leave LGA at 6:30 AM and arrive roughly 2 1/2 hrs later. Well 2 months went by & an Email was sent saying that flight was switched to 7:05...Not a huge deal but whatever.

Return flight from MCO 8 days later was originally set for 2:55 PM. once again E mail stating that they put us on a 4:05 pm. Then a month later from that they switched us to a 6:00 pm flight....At this point I was livid. We originally had 9th row seating Iand now we're in row 36... They said there's nothing they could do...I spoke w/ a supervisor only to have him say is the best they could do was put us in the preferred section but charge us 39.00 more a person..I was like How is that helping us... Well finally this past Monday they did it again!!! E mail this time changing it back to 6:55 PM....Needless to say I now was on the phone for a total 45 mins. this time, only to find that they did move me up to the 28th row (preferred) with no extra charge....But as we were about to hang up she stated , :
"Don't be surprised if you get another change between now n then." LoL I'm thinking why 4 times isn't enough??? My question is this. I've been flying for at least 35 years now, Has anyone ever had this or anything close to this happend, because I certainly haven't?

You're actually lucky in that Delta notified you. All the times Delta has changed our flights, we've never gotten notified. I find out by checking my flights.

When I booked for our trip in June (back in July), I got two long layovers (3 hours in each direction), and a later return flight than I wanted, to save money and banking on Delta changing the flights so I could adjust to a better suited flight.

Well, it happened... Delta changed the flights... by 15 minutes. That's it (so far). I'm still hoping for a change large enough to get my picks of flights, but with now <4 months away, I'm not holding out hope.

 

[Minnesota!]

I have a similar concern. 45 mins in Atlanta. I'm hoping since I'm flying Air Tran, the gates will be fairly close together.

That's what I hoped, too. Then our 45 minute layover turned into an 8+ hour one. It was ugly.

 

[lost*in*cyberspace]

LOL! You'll be fine. If you are connecting in DEN and have a 30 minute layover, I bet you're flying United (UA) versus Frontier or Southwest. If so, good luck for just flying UA

While UA has cleaned up their act quite a bit over the past few months, you may still have departure issues in DEN simply due to the airline integration....

The integration of UA and CO happened a year ago. It isn't causing flight departure delays.

I'll take my free, more legroom E+ seats and frequent free upgrades to business/first class, free checked bags, priority security lines, FF miles I can use on many other airlines and for international flights, which I get being a FF on UA over flying on Delta any day,

 

[iheartmickey1111]

The integration of UA and CO happened a year ago. It isn't causing flight departure delays.

I'll take my free, more legroom E+ seats and frequent free upgrades to business/first class, free checked bags, priority security lines, FF miles I can use on many other airlines and for international lights, which I get being a FF on UA over flying on Delta any day,

Agreed! We live in a VERY small town, so we only have United as an option for getting Disney anyway, unless we want to drive 3 hours to another state for a different airport. Last year we DID do that, and we flew on Frontier- worst flight of my life!!! They almost ruined our trip (LONG story) and when their broke *** plane made us sit on the tarmac for almost 3 hours, we missed our connection to Disney, so we had to go from Utah to Denver, Denver to Texas, Texas to Orlando...and to top it off they nearly lost ALL my daughters clothing because they weren't paying attention to what they were doing!

I have NEVER had a problem or delay with United though. They also consistently have the cheap airfare for my flights.

 

[DizDaD7]

Hey be nice!

Sorry. I didnt mean it to come off sounding mean im just curious how that would work that's all.

 

[DizDaD7]

LOL! You'll be fine. If you are connecting in DEN and have a 30 minute layover, I bet you're flying United (UA) versus Frontier or Southwest. If so, good luck for just flying UA

While UA has cleaned up their act quite a bit over the past few months, you may still have departure issues in DEN simply due to the airline integration problems. Also if your flight from SLC is delayed, it is likely the plane you're taking from DEN to MCO may also be delayed in arriving.

Delta is notorious for changing aircraft more than once as the schedules are amended as the departure date gets closer. With DL, I generally keep an eye on the reservation either through DL.com or better yet via a tracking site like TripIt. Award Wallet was the BEST, but DL killed their interaction via the website.

Bottom line, you want to know about the change before an email is sent, since these are slow to be delivered. If you watch it yourself, then you'll be positioned to grab the seats yourself once the system rearranges everyone.

The good news is that DL has the best in-flight customer service out of all the legacy airlines, IMO. Also if you have a problem, the @deltaassist twitter is the fastest and most responsive way to communicate with the airline. https://twitter.com/DeltaAssist Frequent Fliers like this option over their elite call reps many times.

In addition, if your schedule changes by an hour of more, DL is excellent at allowing you to change your flights to whatever flight you want as long as the origination and departure cities are the same. Thus if the flight you really wanted was too expensive, they will allow you to get on this one for free (pending availability).

Thnx for the info.

 

[iheartmickey1111]

Sorry. I didnt mean it to come off sounding mean im just curious how that would work that's all.

I'm no air traffic controller... however, I have learned that smaller airports do it all the time. My specific airport never has anyone there until 7 am, so when you have 6 am flights, there isn't anyone there. I would assume that they would be in contact with other ATC's possibly and use all those fancy airplane gadgets so you dont fly into another plane. My airport here said that the only time it becomes a problem at our small airport is when there is bad fog or other bad weather.

 

[Greysword]

The integration of UA and CO happened a year ago. It isn't causing flight departure delays.

I'll take my free, more legroom E+ seats and frequent free upgrades to business/first class, free checked bags, priority security lines, FF miles I can use on many other airlines and for international flights, which I get being a FF on UA over flying on Delta any day,

LOL! If you were Platinum on Delta, American, or US you'd get the same benefits, but I'm glad to hear UA is doing better. Six months ago, they were having serious issues, and my experience is that United had customer service issues for decades now. Hopefully, the ship is turning around.

Agreed! We live in a VERY small town, so we only have United as an option for getting Disney anyway, unless we want to drive 3 hours to another state for a different airport. Last year we DID do that, and we flew on Frontier- worst flight of my life!!! They almost ruined our trip (LONG story) and when their broke *** plane made us sit on the tarmac for almost 3 hours, we missed our connection to Disney, so we had to go from Utah to Denver, Denver to Texas, Texas to Orlando...and to top it off they nearly lost ALL my daughters clothing because they weren't paying attention to what they were doing!

I have NEVER had a problem or delay with United though. They also consistently have the cheap airfare for my flights.

I'm glad UA works well for you. I would caution against judging an airline by one trip, as all of them could have the same problems. Just read about United's woes last summer.

I figured it was likely UA you were flying, though. In relation to your original question, 30 minutes is stiff at DEN, but not impossible, since United owns airside B and they are concentrated there. I don't think they have aircraft at any other section, so you'd likely be ok with a tight connection there, as it is a straight shot from one side to the other with moving walkways in sections to help speed things along.