Airline weather delays = compensation?

On Apr 8, 8:56 am, "JSmith" <ppost...@sympatico.ca> wrote:
> The point here is the bad weather did not affect the flight, the
> plane, the crew, the departure airport or the arrival airport. The
> flight left virtually on schedule. It was only US Airways inability to
> cope with a normal and expected problem that occurs frequently in
> airport operations that caused our problems.

OP asked whether there was any legal recourse against an airline which was understaffed for a ticket-line crunch during a weather crisis and therefore was unable to process his family's tickets in time to get them aboard their flight that was one of the few still leaving as scheduled.  I understand and sympathize with your frustration at seeing your perfectly capable plane leave without you to a destination unaffected by the bad weather because the ticket agents couldn't take care of you in time to board you, but I respectfully disagree with your position that this is not a weather-related problem.

ISTM what you are asking USAirways to do is to "triage" the stranded passengers in their waiting lounge, taking care first of those whom they might still be able to get on a flight that is leaving soon, and leaving until later those whose flights have been cancelled due to weather who will have to stay several additional hours or overnight in any case.   Why do you feel that this is necessarily fairer than the first-come, first-served method they apparently did employ?

My cynical side tells me the only reason you think it would be fairer is that you were on the losing end of the first-come method and would benefit personally if they had used a triage method.  I'm guessing most of the people in the crowd would have disagreed and felt that first-come, first-served was a fairer way to handle it, especially if (as most of them were) they were sitting around trying to cope with cancelled flights anyway, and saw your party waltzing to the front of the line to be put on a flight that was still leaving.   Wouldn't you feel that way too if the shoe was on the other foot?

Even if triage were a fairer method, how would they do it?  How do they figure out, without making specific inquiries, whether a party is one that they still might be able to get on a soon-departing flight, or whether they will have to sit in the back of the room for a while anyway?  Should they have set up a separate line only for those lucky passengers whose flights were _not_ cancelled?  But wouldn't that then disadvantage those whose flights were cancelled, but who would still be able to be placed on an alternate flight if they acted quickly enough?   Even if they were doing triage, couldn't they assume that those whose flights were still departing normally could take care of themselves and didn't need special service?  Isn't that what the automated boarding-pass kiosks for e-ticket holders are for?  And though ISTR your problem was also due to a malfunctioning e-ticket machine, which compounded your problem, the only sure way to avoid all kinds of boarding delays and hassles is to have an actual boarding pass in hand before you get to the airport, avoid checking any luggage, and go directly through security to your boarding gate, where as long as the plane is still there with the door open, you can get on it.   About the only other way to avoid dealing with masses of hoi polloi all jockeying for favor vs. limited resources is to do what the rich do, and have your own private chartered flight waiting for you with a red carpet.   Otherwise, the service providers have no principled reason to favor you over all the other people clamoring for attention and quick service.

Bottom line is, IMO you don't have much chance of successfully suing the airline for your missed flight.  Even though you wound up on the short end of the stick, their response to the unexpected crunch of missed flights (first-come, first-served) was one reasonable way to do it.   In the end, somebody always is going to be disadvantaged by whichever method they chose, and it seems they chose the method that would please the largest percentage of the waiting crowd.

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Mike Jacobs
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