worst flight

what was the worst flight you have had, what was the worst thing that happened to you on a flight??? ware were you flying to and on what airline.

Me i was on Continental from cleveland to orlando. i had to go to the bathroom so i did when i was in the bathroom the seatbelt light came on because of turbulance. So im in the rocking all around woundering whats going on. So i step out and walking back to my seat was a trip and a half i would rock one way and the plane would rock. finally i got to my seat and it was over with but still have a good memory of it.

The guy in the seat next to me decided to upchuck his Wendy’s chili all over me :frowning:

Lots of memorably good flights; relatively few memorably bad flights.

Several flights were plagued with seatbacks that didn’t recline, along with noisy kids behind me who did their best to put their little feet though my back. Unresponsive parents who couldn’t control their kids on full flights, so I couldn’t move. GRRRRRR!

Similarly, I was the culprit once. It was a relocation flight KDFW/KLAX, first class for family of five. My one-year-old turned out to have clogged ears and screamed for the entire flight, first-class. I’d gladly have accepted parachutes for him and for me.

Then there was Qantas Bangkok/Amsterdam with a two-hour refueling stop in Athens. We all had to deplane at 2:30 a.m. Worst %#$*^ transit terminal I’ve ever been in in my entire life.

There was another family of five disaster – this one on World Airlines, I believe. We had just come from Europe into KJFK and had connected to a red-eye to KLAX. It was a six-hour flight or so and the circumstances were that we were famished. Thirty minutes into the flight, we got the turbulence warning to stay in seats with belts fastened. That’s how it went for the whole flight and there was only occasional minimal turbulence.

There was no cabin service for the entire flight. No food. No beverages. Never once being allowed to take the kids to the lav. Unsympathetic flight attendants who came right to the seats to scold us if they saw threatened cabin movement, but at the same time never brought a pillow or anything to make the flight a bit comfortable. That was followed by only a perfunctory response by management to a written complaint. “Regulations require … (etc., etc.).”

On another flight, Garuda Singapore/Jakarta (no kids this time), cabin staff sat in the back and slept throughout the entire flight. Thankfully, it’s just a short flight. No service.

The grand-daddy story was TWA LAX/LHR. I was flying first class and had a two-hour connection wait for BAW to SVG. The plane had hydraulic problems at LAX and left four hours late. I knew there was no hope of making my scheduled connection, but it was first-class with fine service. I was booked on a helicopter to GTW, SAS to CPH, SAS again to Kristiansand, and Busy Bee to SVG, the last flight in the air in Norway that night. I got in about 14 hours late, but it was an adventure. I also watched perhaps 100 people raising holy hell at TWA’s connection desk in London. That tale is for a later reply.

Although I might say that was my worst flight ever, actually it’s a fond memory now.

Since I was a USAir (then later, USAirways) F/A for years, I’ve got more horror stories than most. So, to be fair, I’ll list the worst and the best flight.

The worst flight for me was on an old DC-9 that was slated to be shelved, so they didn’t bother to upgrade anything on the plane. The F/A jumpseat was basically a piece of plywood covered with cloth - no cushion to speak of. And it was a bench, meaning two F/As had to sit on the same seat. I was the lead F/A, and they paired me with a six-foot tall male F/A who weighed 250lbs if he weighed an ounce. We smushed ourselves uncomfortably together on the bench jumpseat for takeoff (can you see where this is going)… and when the engines thrust for liftoff, there was a sharp “CRACK” and the bolts sheared, and the plywood jumpseat slammed onto the floor, basically throwing us on our butts with the same force as if we’d jumped off a kitchen counter. We both suffered neck injuries. I was out of work for over a year, in physical therapy, and when I tried to return to work I found that the nerves in my neck can’t take the backward pressure of takeoff in a jumpseat. So that flight was what ended my career as an F/A. Since 9/11 happened during my stint in recovery, I was actually sort of relieved not to be going back to flying from LGA to Washington, DC multiple times a day, like a pingpong ball in a terrorist target game.

The best flight was one way back when we were still serving food (remember them good ole days?). The entire plane was full of German tourists. I mean every single passenger. The whole plane. They’d all been flying for 12 hours or so when they boarded, so the air quality wasn’t all that great, but… let me just diverge a second here and explain that on a “normal” food service flight, it takes at least four F/As with two garbage carts to collect garbage and prep the cabin for landing. Partially because “normal” American travelers are complete slobs. They leave things ripped open, sprawled all over the place, they try to put dirty diapers in the food garbage instead of disposing of them properly in the restroom, and all sorts of shenanigans. Sometimes we’d have to fill the carts and go back with more empty carts to collect all the refuse, which took more time. But on this one flight full of German tourists, I decided to take one cart out ahead of time, to give the other crew members time to eat and get things ready. By myself, with ONE CART, I collected all the garbage from that entirely full plane… in less than 10 minutes.

How is that even possible? I’ll tell you why. Because every single one of those passengers had crumpled up their drink containers to the smallest size possible, and fit every single scrap of waste back into the container the lunches were handed out in. There wasn’t a stray napkin, much less a dirty diaper, visible. Every single lunch box lid had been closed and tucked back into its original flap so that it almost looked as though the passengers were handing me back untouched lunches.

The faces on the other F/A’s when I told them I’d just collected the entire cabin’s garbage by myself were hysterical. None of them believed it, either. I will never forget that flight. It just brought home to me what a difference people can make when they are polite and conscientious and don’t expect other people to clean up after them.

Okay, okay… just one more good story. It was Christmas Day. I was working, as usual. The crew had gathered in the first class galley for our pre-flight briefing. The F/O was there, but the captain was a few minutes late. When he arrived, we went ahead with the briefing. Then the captain said, “Sorry I was a little late today… I ran into Santa Claus on my way to the gate. He said to give you these.” And he reached into his jacket pocket and pulled out a bunch of envelopes. Each one contained a really nice gift certificate to one of the airport stores in our base airport (CLT). And each envelope was marked, so we could choose something that we’d really like. Book store, or Bath & Body Works, or one of the restaurants. He paid for those gift cards out of his own pocket (they weren’t cheapies, either - at least $50 each!) and gave us, his crew, a little lift because we didn’t get to spend the holiday with our families. We all gave him a huge hug and a heartfelt thank-you.

US flew DC-10’s… do tell…

I think it was a 10… maybe a 9? It’s been so long, hard to remember all the makes. I know it was a DC getting ready to be relegated to the dustbin, and I know it killed my neck. Numbers at this point… well, it was one of them.

Yep, it was a DC-9… found this on the USAirways history page:

“On July 1, 2000, the US Airways Shuttle merged into the mainline operation of US Airways. At the same time, the Boeing 727s started being withdrawn from the fleet initially replacing them with DC-9 series 30s and Boeing 737-300s until the brand new Airbus A320s started arriving.”

That’s what they told us - we had to fly the old DC-9s until the new planes came in, and they didn’t upgrade them at all in the meantime.

Would have thought it was kinda hard to mistake a twin aisle that seat 250+ with a single aisle that will seat 150, but that’s just me, I guess.

Since I never flew on a DC-10 I guess I wouldn’t know. I got the number wrong. Good catch.

Mine was boringly mundane, also my first time in an airplane. Army was flying me from Fort Ord to Fort Sam Houston starting with a ‘cute’ little barely-an-airplane looing thing puddlejumping down the coast to LAX in July. After taking off into the fog, it wasn’t so bad. The first stop I believe was in San Luis Obispo. I was uneasy about dropping back into the fog. Dropped down under the cloud deck and all I could see was a pasture full of cows coming closer fast - I was sure we were joining them!

Jammed-packed Friday afternoon AA flight, KDFW-KBOS, early 1980’s on a trip home from KSAT. Our DC10 suffered a significant mechanical, and set down at KLIT. They flew a 727 in from either KDFW or Tulsa in the early evening to pick up the first half of the pax, and planned to send a replacement DC10 later in the evening to get the rest of us and protect the equipment assignment for the next day. Unfortunately, a line of severe storms had KDFW totally screwed up, and the inbound DC10 crew was very late getting out. Another storm system passed over KLIT long enough to delay landing - so much so that the flight crew didn’t have time to make it to KBOS. There was talk of them taking us to KSTL for a recrew - but the same storm system was expected to arrive THERE about the same time we would, and it was decided not to take the chance. AA finally got a 727 in to fetch the rest of us about 7 am, and I got home to the company apartment (I was in a management training program at the time) about 1 pm Saturday

At four pm, my boss called me to say there was situation in Texas, and I needed to go to Dallas Sunday night. :open_mouth:

USAir PHX to Los Cabos (SJD). 2 women at the forward bulkhead seats decided that just as we disconnected from the tug, that it was a great time to get up and go walkies down the aisle. FA’s screaming at them to get back in their seats. Captain comes on PA after hitting the brakes pretty hard, and tells them he ain’t going nowhere until they sit down and that they have already cost us several places for takeoff.

Short final to SJD, (and I mean SHORT final, like rotating) They get up again! FA’s are REALLY shouting now. They both landed in their seats about the same time as the wheels touched! They might still be in a Mexican jail.

I was on a dc 9-30 from northwest just before they retired that plane. I was at the last seat with no window and no recline plus there was heavy turbulence and I ended up throwing up my burger king :imp: hated that flight home

Mine was pretty much the same as Cole’s, only without the throwing up. Not sure if it was a DC-9 or MD-80 or what, but something in that family. Those back seats with no windows are the worst!!! No view, a very narrow cabin at that point, the bulkhead bending in on you, and a jet engine seemingly six inches from your ear. It’s the only time in my life I’ve ever felt claustrophobic – and I really, really, really felt claustrophobic, to the point that I practically wanted to crawl out over the seat in front of me.

The MD-80 is a DC-9. MD-80 is the marketing name for the DC-9-80 series.

I love flying in the back of aircraft with engines on the tails, namely the 727 and the DC-9. Never had the problems mentioned in the above posts.

Reading the posts , seems as if a lot of people had bad experiences on the DC 9. Delta DC9-50 was the best airplane I have flown. My worst was on a southwest 737-700 on route from JAN to HOU. Pilot was cleared to land in a severe storm in Houston. Descending into Houston we encountered the worst turbulence I have ever been in. Passengers were screaming, some were crying. It felt like we weren’t gonna make it. Fortunately we aborted the landing and flew over to Austin. Pilot came over the PA, he couldn’t really speak. You could tell he was shaken up.