Somebody please close that door...

Being stranded due to a flight cancelation in a tropical paradise should be a good thing right? Not so much for Delta flight 560 out of Bermuda yesterday.

Not sure what the protocol is for handling stranded passengers but what happened to us was appalling. When we got the news that a rear door on our jet had been inadvertently damaged and the plane could not safely take off, flight attendants announced that more information on resuming our travel or the possibility of having to stay another night would be forthcoming in the terminal.

Well that never happened.

All of the 200 plus passengers returned to the terminal and assembled like lemming in a long line with an obscure purpose. No one could tell us what we were waiting for; if our jet would

eventually be repaired and deemed travel worthy; what was the likelihood we could rebook travel through other airlines; or if accommodations could be made if we needed to fly out the next day.

We stood around literally for hours with no clear direction about what to do, no general announcement, no helpful advice from anyone at any time.

Several Delta airline agents did an outstanding job of trying to manage the throng of frustrated and soon angry travelers rushing the desk while having to continually explain the different options to each individual passenger depending on what their final destination might be. All this while boarding other flights to other destinations, talk about a mess.

When asked about an announcement with useful information for all of us a Delta agent politely told me that they were waiting for a supervisor to instruct them.

Several of us who had no other option were finally booked on the flight for the next day then waited several more hours for the “supervisor” to confirm a hotel to accommodate us. We were told rooms were scarce due to spring break however passengers with phones confirmed lots of availability in several hotels.

So for more than four hours after debarking our doomed flight we were trapped in the BDA airport having cleared customs to return to the states. We were the proverbial men and women without a country. We were never offered food or drink until one of the Delta agents waved two $20 bills over the throng of people. A man grabbed them and went straight to the bar and bought as many drinks as he could for stranded passengers. Trust me, it didn’t go far and by that time I had already purchased a Corona for the price of a six-pack in the states.

By the time I finally arrived at the Fairmont in Hamilton at nearly 7 pm, having arrived at 10:30 for my 12:10 flight, I had been in the airline’s custody for more than eight hours and hadn’t gotten anywhere.

Then to add insult to injury the hotel had no reservation for us and doubted they could accommodate us. We sat for another half an hour wondering where we would be shipped off to when a Fairmont manager took pity on us and booked us into available rooms in the Gold level.  

Oh happy day. Over.

 Suggestion Delta: A little triage from the start would have gone a very long way to assuage the hostility in the end. 

• ·      Why weren’t the passengers gathered in one place and given an update?
• ·      Why weren’t passengers who were willing to rebook for the next day given that option from the start and sent on their way? That would have gone a long way to defuse the chaos.
• ·      Why weren’t travelers with different issues separated; for example those who had Boston as a final destination, those who had connecting flights to elsewhere, and the man who had a group of 40 people who held the attention of one agent for nearly two hours?!
• ·      Don’t wait till the last minute to book rooms for passengers you know can’t go anywhere else.
•  Lastly, the agents at the gate needed help!!! They were, under the circumstances, very composed and professional in the face of pure chaos and each deserve high praise. The supervisor who hid downstairs should have come up at some point to facilitate some order but we never saw that person.

Ultimately, those of us stranded here were given fine accommodations but it was little comfort after hours of pointless waiting that could have been avoided had anyone been paying attention from a corporate or even an administrative perspective.

I can’t believe Delta doesn’t have a better protocol for this kind of situation. I realize it was an unintended accident but honestly, this can’t be the first time this has happened in the airline’s long and prestigious history.