SACRAMENTO, Calif — Sunday's internet outage at Sacramento International Airport created headaches for travelers who waited in long lines and had plans delayed or even canceled.
One of those travelers was Jenny Lindsay and her 16-year-old son. The two of them missed their Christmas cruise to Ensenada, Mexico on Carnival Cruises after their flight was delayed.
"I thought, 'I'm going to get there in time,'" Lindsay explained. "I've made such an early flight. Nothing’s going to go wrong.'"
Lindsay planned the cruise with her mother and sister for sentimental reasons.
"My sister's husband had recently passed away in October from cancer, and so we thought, 'Let's do something very different this year,'" Lindsay said. "And so how about a cruise to Mexico."
Her flight was originally scheduled to depart at 10:10 in the morning. She needed to arrive at the cruise out of Long Beach no later than 5:15 p.m. The flight would normally take about one hour and 15 minutes.
Lindsay received her first notification at 6:30 a.m. about her flight being delayed. It would be just the beginning of many more notifications pushing the flight time further and further back.
She didn’t know about the internet outage when she arrived at the airport.
"The chaos I saw was — I'd never seen anything like it before," Lindsay admitted. "There were thousands of people in the airport, and I couldn’t find the end of the line. It was serpentine around and around and around."
After further delay notifications, Lindsay said she decided to switch to another flight. She eventually made it through the horrendous lines and through security. Then, her gate was changed. She finally boarded her flight only to then wait an additional two hours on the runway.
"I was on the phone to the cruise line," Lindsay explained. "The woman said the ramp goes up — she said you have until 5:15, and then we’ll bring the ramp up, no later than that."
Unfortunately, Lindsay’s flight finally landed at 5:45 p.m. and she missed her cruise. Lindsay made it to the dock in time to watch the cruise boat sail away.
She's able to laugh it off now, but she felt very different Sunday night. "I was quite a case that night," Lindsay said.
Lindsay said she believes there are many things that could have been done differently by both Southwest Airline and the airport.
"I guess bottom line is, they didn’t have a plan for emergencies like this," Lindsay said.
Lindsay said she wishes she’d been made aware of the problem earlier. She believes she could have driven herself or booked another flight at an other airport.
"I think Southwest could have texted me and all of the people and maybe mention, 'We're going to have problems all day. If you’re able to find another means to get to where you need to get to, do it now,'" Lindsay said.
Lindsay also said she doesn’t understand why the airport or airline wouldn’t have multiple ways to access the internet. Finally, Lindsay said she was frustrated by the organization of lines and what she said was a lack of employees to handle the problem.
The ordeal is all behind her now, but Lindsay said she hopes to take another cruise with her mom and sister in the future. She acknowledged what she would have been up to had everything worked out as planned.
"I'd be having a drink on the ship with my sister and my mom, and we’d be having fun," Lindsay sighed.
Follow the conversation on Facebook with Mike Duffy.
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