Tim Frank
Vice Admiral
- Joined
- Jul 29, 2008
- Messages
- 5,346
It bothered me for years that airlines never seemed to update their flight arrival times accurately when they started to slip. Never knew whether this was just a lack of interest or deliberate.
Say you are meeting someone on a flight at 4:45 pm....you check their arrival times at 4:00 before you head to the airport and they are 15 minutes late....so you check at 4:30, they are still 15 minutes late so you head to the airport....only to wait out there as the flight time rolls back constantly and they are 2 hours late. When you talk to your arriving passenger you find out that they were two hours late DEPARTING.
How do you excuse that?
About 5 years ago my dad and I were coming back from NC and were changing planes in Philly. The airline (nameless since I don't think they are any better or worse than any others....) was admitting to a 45 minute delay. I was sitting with a laptop and had a wireless connection active, a pilot wandered over and asked where I was going and after i told him he said he was the pilot on the outgoing flight....we were waiting for an incoming flight and would be using that aircraft with a new crew.
He said if I would lend him the laptop for 2 minutes he'd find out what was going on since he didn't believe his ground/gate personnel.
He connected to a website that tracks flights using info from the FAA/ATC .
Turns out that the incoming flight had not even departed yet and was 1-3/4 hours out still ....at least.
Fast forward...right now i am waiting to go and P/U my daughter. The airline (no names, but its initials are Air Canada...
) is saying that the flight is 10 minutes late.
The web link is saying 45 minutes....they even show a map and the plane's location and altitude, remaining time and distance.
Gives me and extra 30 minutes....at least, so I thought I'd share.
For anyone who might be interested => http://www.flytecomm.com/trackflight
Say you are meeting someone on a flight at 4:45 pm....you check their arrival times at 4:00 before you head to the airport and they are 15 minutes late....so you check at 4:30, they are still 15 minutes late so you head to the airport....only to wait out there as the flight time rolls back constantly and they are 2 hours late. When you talk to your arriving passenger you find out that they were two hours late DEPARTING.
How do you excuse that?
About 5 years ago my dad and I were coming back from NC and were changing planes in Philly. The airline (nameless since I don't think they are any better or worse than any others....) was admitting to a 45 minute delay. I was sitting with a laptop and had a wireless connection active, a pilot wandered over and asked where I was going and after i told him he said he was the pilot on the outgoing flight....we were waiting for an incoming flight and would be using that aircraft with a new crew.
He said if I would lend him the laptop for 2 minutes he'd find out what was going on since he didn't believe his ground/gate personnel.
He connected to a website that tracks flights using info from the FAA/ATC .
Turns out that the incoming flight had not even departed yet and was 1-3/4 hours out still ....at least.
Fast forward...right now i am waiting to go and P/U my daughter. The airline (no names, but its initials are Air Canada...
) is saying that the flight is 10 minutes late.The web link is saying 45 minutes....they even show a map and the plane's location and altitude, remaining time and distance.
Gives me and extra 30 minutes....at least, so I thought I'd share.
For anyone who might be interested => http://www.flytecomm.com/trackflight
