Beating Airport Delay Tips

A Long Airport Delay

There is nothing that can put a damper on your vacation like an airport delay. The last time I flew to Hawaii, we had a flight delay of several hours. This in itself wasn't unusual, but the circumstances made it worse.

You see, I was just coming back from a business trip when I went off on a family vacation to Hawaii. Basically, I came in at six in the evening and had to leave again at three in the morning. This was enough of a hassle, but once we found the airplane was delayed, it made things much worse. There wasn't even a good reason for the airport delay – at least they couldn't tell us one. All they could say was that the airline was running late. We had to wait for several hours because someone couldn't make it to their job on time or something like that.

Airport delays aren't uncommon things, but what I didn't realize at the time was how much better reporting has gotten. Strangely enough, although the flight delay information wasn't relayed to us in the airport, it was on the FAA website. There is an airline delay tracking website that anyone can look at before their flight, and it tends to have all the relevant information about flight delays. If I had known this at the time, I might have found out and not had to leave so far ahead of time. It is always good to check airline information before you head out.

To be honest, I haven't bothered in years. There used to be so little info available that I did not feel there was much of a point to it. I remember a few times when I would check the airport delay and they would tell me it was running 15 minutes late but, by the time I got to the airline, it would be running two hours late. Other times, they would move the flight up at the last minute. Therefore, it really didn't do me any good to find out if there was an airplane delay.

Nowadays, however, things are different. I guess all the complaints they used to get must have made something change within the agency. Whatever the reason, there has been a change. I have checked for airport delays every single time I've flown since then, and every single time I've gotten pretty accurate and reasonable information. It is good to have something you can depend on in the airlines!