A packed flight. A weather delay. Angry passengers — many of them crying.
It sounds like a flight to Anywhere, USA, this summer. Except that I was on this flight, and it didn’t end like you would expect, especially if you believe all the recent media reports about the state of air travel.
JetBlue 577 from Newburgh, NY, to Orlando was scheduled to leave at 2:50 p.m. yesterday, but at one point it appeared the flight might be delayed for more than an hour. We arrived at the terminal to find a lot of unhappy passengers and their offspring, presumably all on their way to Disneyworld or some other Central Florida theme park.
Here’s a picture I took of the boys while we waited.
Even though a delay seemed inevitable, the crew turned the plane around quickly and we left just a little late. Onboard, the flight attendants went to work immediately to soothe frayed nerves by handing out cookies to the crying kids before takeoff. (All three of our children were the grateful recipients of a package of animal crackers.)
The attitude of the flight attendants really impressed me. You would expect crewmembers to be just a little disgruntled, with all the recent bad publicity and the resulting fallout.
Instead, they were cheerful, eager to please and sociable. I haven’t seen that on a domestic flight in a long time, at least not to that extent.
The attendant assigned to our section of the plane handled herself well, considering that she had several screaming children (including, at times, ours) to contend with. She talked with them, brought them extra drinks and even gave them a set of wings before we landed.
Oh, and the flight arrived early.
But here’s what really made my day. At the luggage carousel we saw our flight attendant again.
“I thought I’d find you here,” she said. “You left this on the plane.”
She handed us the kids seatbelt I had been testing for National Geographic Traveler. We had somehow forgotten it.
All I could do was thank her, and shake my head in disbelief.
I haven’t had a bad flight all summer. I haven’t even had a delayed flight.
Am I living in some kind of parallel universe?
At any rate, my hat’s off to JetBlue and in particular to our attendant on Flight 577. Thanks for bringing some dignity back to air travel this summer.
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{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Don’t delay, buy lottery tickets today… before your luck changes :-)
I just wanted to thank you for your nice piece about the difficult JetBlue flight you experienced. So much travel writing is of the whiny variety. Air travel sucks, airlines are stupid, security is hell, wah, wah, wah.
I find the endless complaining not just tiring, but on the whole useless. All the complaining is just so much wind. Tell me what you’re going to do to make it better, or tell me what I can do to make it better. Simply recounting horror stories is just depressing.
Sadly, I suspect that I’m in the minority and that the whining and horror stories sell like mad.
Anyway, it made me happy to see a well written piece about individuals doing their best in difficult circumstances.
That is what you get for flying JetBlue. They provide the most humane coach experience in the industry. And nobody else is even close. Too bad they don’t have a better FF program.
Last weekend I went to Detroit from New York Laguardia, their direct flight and we left on Friday morning when the weather was very iffy and a must say that every thing went perfectly, going and coming back to NY. Check- in easy, security not bad, flight took off on time landed on time. Luggage came off pretty quickly and the same on the return trip except there was no bad weather. There are positive experiences these days when flying. Bravo to Northwest!
Jsut read your Jet Blue article on the nice flight you had to Orlando with family. You gave credit to the “attendant” on the flight. Just wanted to remind you that for a flight attendant to get any recognition for good service, their name must be mentioned to the company. At least that’s the way it was when our daughter was flying for Delta in the 80s and 90s. And those “recognitions” are very important to the employees. Thanks.
I am very pleased that you enjoyed flying with us here at JetBlue.
As a crewmember I can attest to the fact that we do try our hardest, despite having the constant shadow of bad publicity, to provide customers with outstanding service.
Everytime I hear or see a comment like yours about service on our airline, I’m left with the pride that comes from working for a company like JetBlue.
I look forwards to serving you on a future jetBlue flight!