SYRACUSE, N.Y. (WSYR-TV) — People can’t catch a flight or a break…the travel nightmare continues.
Thousands of U.S. flights were either canceled or delayed over the weekend, leaving many people stranded at the airport, and having to come up with another plan.
For Amanda Maddison of Clay, a “mommy getaway” quickly turned into a “mommy nightmare.”
“I had a girls’ weekend in Nashville, I flew down with no issue, had a really great weekend,” says Maddison.
But the mom of three says the plane ride home was a total disaster.
Maddison was originally scheduled to fly out of Nashville on Monday morning, landing in Syracuse later that afternoon, but an eight hour delay in Nashville led Amanda to miss her connecting flight. She was rerouted through Boston to JFK, and then to Syracuse, but another delay in Boston left her stranded for 7 hours at JFK — where she found herself sleeping on the floor.
“So my options, once I got to JFK last night at 1:00 a.m., was to take an early flight this morning from JFK back to Boston to connect to Syracuse, wait until 11 o’clock tonight to try and get that original Syracuse flight from last night, or fly instead to Rochester. So this morning I chose to fly to Rochester and my husband and three children got up early and drove to Rochester to pick me up from the Rochester International Airport instead,” says Maddison.
Maddison added, “I did blatantly ask for a refund on the trip and they told me no, that I would not be entitled to a refund but possibly up to a $200 dollar compensation, which seems like a drop in the bucket compared to the cost of the flight and the inconvenience.”
Maddison says this isn’t the first time she’s had a bad experience with JetBlue. This past weekend was the icing on the cake, though, and she says she plans on never flying the airline again.
However, JetBlue wasn’t the only airline canceling flights this past weekend and this week. Southwest, American, Delta, and United are among the airlines with delays or cancellations.
“There’s been many, many flight cancelations due to a variety of reasons. This past weekend there was in fact a lot of weather. Weather creates backlog throughout the system,” says Brian Murray, the director of travel for AAA Western and Central New York.
AAA is reminding travelers to download their airline’s app on their smartphone, which will notify you if your flight is canceled or delayed.
“Many times the airline would automatically rebook you on another flight if your flight is canceled. If they don’t automatically do that, they will assist you, or you can go on the app yourself and rebook,” says Murray.
Travelers are also encouraged to get travel insurance to cover unexpected delays or trip interruptions.
NewsChannel 9 reached out to JetBlue Airline and is still waiting to hear back.