Your worst flight?

[TLandHim]

We all fly and there are always little "ädventures" but what are your worst flights?

One of our many
We left Phuket the other day with heaps of time and everything went smoothly. Flew to Kuala Lumpur and on attempting to land, we struck a lot of turbulence and got to about 30’ off the runway and the pilot put on full power and went around. We flew around for a while and he tried again but had to abort again. We then flew around and I realised we were flying a straight course. They made a couple of announcements in Bahasa but no one understood them and we were all trying to work out what was happening including the cabin staff.
Soon we were descending and I realised we were not flying into Kuala Lumpur and when we had landed we were told we were at Johore Bahru (southern tip of Malaysia near Singapore). They kept the plane and us, out on the tarmac and refuelled and we took off back to KL. We landed about 2 hours after our flight for NZ had left, by this time it was after midnight and we were pretty tired. Went and we rebooked at the Malaysia counter amidst a lot of confused people who had missed flights (40+ to the UK). Finally booked to NZ and very pleased to find there was a flight out at 8:40am. Offered a hotel for the night by Malaysia Airlines but we declined. By the time you get to the hotel it is almost time to come back to the airport so we just stayed and napped on the seats.

All ended up OK, just got back to NZ after midnight on Friday. Pleased to see our bags on the Carousel.

[nelsonone]

Air India flight to London which went via Moscow...about 35 years ago

The first leg was very late due to engine troubles and we sat on the tarmac for about 2hrs before returning to the gate for about 3 hours whilst repairs were carried out...during the flight some drunk Indian guy in the seat behind me decide he preferred my seat...so he climbed over the top of his seat and perched on top of my head..it took several people including a very angry me to drag him away...

Once in Moscow we were deplaned and held in a waiting pen whilst more repairs were carried out...we were in that pen for about 6 hours before being herded onto buses and taken to a hotel in downtown Moscow....we had our passports taken from us and weren't allowed to leave the hotel...in the morning the plane still wasn't ready so they took us on a bus trip around the city however we allowed to get out of the bus...breakfast was porridge with no milk, lunch was a hard stale roll with some identifiable tube meat on it and that night it I was served a piece of lettuce with condensed milk as an entree for dinner followed by borsch...fortunately we were all woken up at about 3am the next morning and once again herded onto a bus back to the airport...it was like some kind of kafkaesque kidnap/imprisonment experience

[kuhio]

Air India flight to London which went via Moscow...about 35 years ago

The first leg was very late due to engine troubles and we sat on the tarmac for about 2hrs before returning to the gate for about 3 hours whilst repairs were carried out...during the flight some drunk Indian guy in the seat behind me decide he preferred my seat...so he climbed over the top of his seat and perched on top of my head..it took several people including a very angry me to drag him away...

Once in Moscow we were deplaned and held in a waiting pen whilst more repairs were carried out...we were in that pen for about 6 hours before being herded onto buses and taken to a hotel in downtown Moscow....we had our passports taken from us and weren't allowed to leave the hotel...in the morning the plane still wasn't ready so they took us on a bus trip around the city however we allowed to get out of the bus...breakfast was porridge with no milk, lunch was a hard stale roll with some identifiable tube meat on it and that night it I was served a piece of lettuce with condensed milk as an entree for dinner followed by borsch...fortunately we were all woken up at about 3am the next morning and once again herded onto a bus back to the airport...it was like some kind of kafkaesque kidnap/imprisonment experience

We have a winner. /Thread

[marc26]

Have two

Chicago to Vancouver:
We just checked out of hotel and were in the Uber for 10mins when got a text our flight was delayed for 90mins. If we got that text 15mins earlier, we would have stayed at hotel.
It ended up being a 10 hour layover.....
Worse was they boarded us, but didn't have pilots.........they then kept us on the plane with no AC for 2 hours when after 1hr on plane everyone was screaming at them to let us off the plane!

Hong Kong to Vancouver
Get to gate and there was legitimately 100 Indians lined up for the flight. They were like wild animals! Laying down in the aisle, just doing all kind of crazy shit.......I spent 10 hours yelling at all these Indians

[Captain]

Was that Indian still on board for the next flight Nels?

[sundancekid]

Ha ha, never going to beat that story for sure Nels. Worst I can remember was when I was about 10 and they had just started commercial flights up in the north of Norway using Twin Otters. As it turned out, quite treacherous wind conditions on some of those small air strips among the mountains... Believe it or not they even had a stewardess serving hot coffee. And we could see straight into the cockpit. Then in one sudden movement the plane was dragged down and anything that was not strapped got thrown up into the ceiling. Luggage, coffee as well as the lovely stewardess. No one was seriously injured, but I've always kept my seat belt on after that.

[nelsonone]

Was that Indian still on board for the next flight Nels?

555....ya know I never did see him again Cappy...555

[nelsonone]

I have another one....less disturbing but kinda funny...

My wife (at the time) took me to the airport to board a flight to Milan 20+ years ago (before mobile phones were in wide usage)...all went well until about 3 hours in (still over AUS/Outback) when I saw one of the jet engines burst into flames on the starboard wing and ground down to a horrible metal scraping stop with smoke bellowing out of it..all the cabin crew ran to the front of the plane screaming...I don't think that is what they were trained to do 555....passengers were crying, screaming, yelling and in general it was panic stations...but the plane carried on, the stews eventually got things calmed down and the captain was pretty cool with some reassuring announcements about how the plane can continue just fine on 3 engines...well that was until he announced about another 30-40 minutes on that we had to turn it around and head back to Sydney for repairs....Fuckit

so after about 8 hours of flying I took a taxi home totally knackered....I must have fallen asleep on the sofa in the dark with just the tv on....my wife had been out at a concert that night and returned home maybe about an hour later..she unlocked the door only to discover a "strange" man in silhouette asleep on her sofa...she screamed at the top of her voice...I woke up startled...she yelled at me also startled...and after we calmed down eventually we both had a good laugh about it all....

[marc26]

I told this story to Nels.

The Thai chef at Ao's restaurant took China Eastern to BKK
They are a horrendous airline.

Of course he did what Thais do and slept the whole time.
He heard them making announcements in Chinese

Well, the plane lands after 13 hours and he gets off and he's back in Vancouver!!
Thinking he was landing in Shanghai to transit.

Halfway through the flight they turned around back to Vancouver 555

[Pablo]

Sort of like Nels's fire story above..555

Had a crew at a major U.S. airline, who suffered an engine failure/fire midway from San Francisco to Hawaii.

While the passengers were freaking out, the cockpit crew completed their respective emergency checklists, and activated the fire extinguishing system.

In an attempt to soothe the passenger nerves, the Captain made a P.A. assuring them that all was taken care of, and the flight was in no danger. He also sent the Flight Engineer back into the cabin and wing area, to visually inspect the engine and situation.

Upon seeing some smoke still exiting the engine nacelle, the Flight Engineer hurriedly jumped back into the aisle and shouted forward..."STILL BURNING". 5555

Very reassuring.

[dawsey]

Got a couple.


1. Back in the late 60's, flying back from the Channel Islands to Southampton in a thunderstorm. The flight had first been delayed for fog (no radar in Bournmouth Airport at the time). I was glad of this as the previous night was spent on an absolute bender drinking Pernod with beer chasers celebrating my parents 25th anniversary. When we boarded, I had a seat that was rear facing and the turbulence was something else in the storm over the English Channel. Never was I so glad to get off, in pouring rain and walk, with my suitcase to the railway station a good mile away. The one time I was terrified on a flight.

2nd. An Air France flight to Abu Dhabi in 1999. Left Heathrow and landed at Charles De Gaulle airport in Paris. That airport is no more than a glorfied warehouse! Caught the Air France flight which was diverted to Riyadh,KSA ,because of a "technical fault".

On landing in Riyadh, all the women had to cover their bare arms, all duty free booze shut in the overhead lockers and any magazine/newpapers with titty pics had to be shut away. The Saudi security came on board to have a nosey and all the doors were left open in searing heat. There was a threat of arrest if their modesty/alcohol laws were broken. That was the longest 4hr I've ever spent, sat there roasting. Finally arriving in Abu Dhabi, Air France had left our luggage in Paris!

[dawsey]

Got very alarmed on my first BKK Airways flight on the turbo props. I'd never seen the dry ice coming out of the ventilation ducts before and thought it was smoke for a minute. Nearly shat my pants!

[dawsey]

One final thing. Has anyone else come to the same conclusion that Indians, as a race, are the rudest people on earth when it comes to Queuing or boarding a plane?

Even though they have an allocated seat, same as everyone, they push and shove in the rush to board. Like fcuking animals.

[kuhio]

They were like wild animals! Laying down in the aisle, just doing all kind of crazy shit.......I spent 10 hours yelling at all these Indians

Fake News Headline: "Flight of Tears: Crass New England Patriot browbeats Indians and calls them wild animals."

[Stillearly]

Flying back from Thailand around the 20th Dec , one hour outside Heathrow , it's announced Heathrow has closed because of snow .... we were diverted to the arse-end of Germany ( Bonn ) , sat on the plane for two hours , and let off into the terminal to await buses to our hotels , only EU passport holder were let through , the rest ( including air crew ) had to sleep in the terminal the first night ... Waited another two hours for the buses , gave up and took a taxi to the hotel , arrived and secured one of the last rooms , before the buses arrived .... next day no idea if we are going back to the airport , we have no luggage , find out we are staying another night about three in the afternoon , I am only wearing jeans and a t shirt and it's snowing outside so can't go anywhere .... next day take extra rations from the breakfast buffet as there the restaurant is going to be closed as no staff working because it's their Xmas party ...leave next morning , but sat on the plane for six hours as they try to de-ice the wings ... take off and eventually get back to Heathrow and one more flight for me to get back home ... think I got home eventually 70+ hours late

[Homer]

My last trip to Vietnam in December was a little like OP's.

Have spent nearly 12 months priming an ex's younger sister (both know each other well and always liked each other) to finally rid herself of the guilts and meet up.
Time constraints meant one day and night is all we had. Pre booked and paid for nice hotel room, she was keen (had to travel 2.5hrs to meet).

Trying to land in Singapore in a storm was eventful. Worst turbulence I've ever experienced. Plane did 12 laps by the flight path thing waiting for it to be safe until it was out of fuel.
So he had a go and had to abort. Even the air hostesses were terrified at the bumps and one let out a little yelp as did the entire plane at one point before he aborted.
Ran 20 minutes to some country airfield in an Indonesian island that I'm pretty sure wasn't designed for A330 heavy.

5 hours on the runway while they negotiated refueling us and we took off back to Singapore.
Missed connecting flight by hours and after stuffing around got to a hotel at 3am on the night I was supposed to be at the hotel. No international SIM so couldn't message her that I wasn't going to be there until I got to the hotel.
Up at 6 to catch another flight to Vietnam.

Finally caught up with a pretty pissed off cute little Viet girl for 2 hours before we had to part ways.
No...didn't get a root 55

[obes]

January 1980, flying into Denpasar the pilot over shoots the runway and we miss going into the drink by metres.

6 weeks later, it's time to leave and the bird I'm with tells me she hears we better get to the airport early, because they'd over booked the plane.

Get to the airport with plenty of time to spare, get our boarding passes and head onto the plane. Take our seats and all appears good.

5 minutes later and a couple are standing next to our seats telling us we're in their seats. Check boarding passes and they've been allocated the same seats.

Hostie talks with the captain an the decisions made - the late comers can either sit on the floor, up the back, or wait for another flight.

The angry couple decide to actually sit on the floor.

Thinking surely this can't get any more bizarre when the hostie comes over the intercom to announce if anybody wants a drink, or bite to eat, to get it themselves from the galley .

Never flown Garuda since - never will again !

[LivinLOS]

ha ha ^^ also had a shocking garuda flight one time but the worst for fear and crappy plane was an Air merpati flight jakarta to denpasar sometime mid 90s.. Was so rough expected locals to be stuffing live animals in the overhead compartment.. The seat ashtrays were overflowing with cig butts and zero cleanup inside.. He came in to land and was swerving left and right trying to line it up last minute, when he did land he Captain Kangaroo'ed it down the runway.. Was a proper shocker.

[marc26]

Fake News Headline: "Flight of Tears: Crass New England Patriot browbeats Indians and calls them wild animals."

Real News headline....
Crass Pat's fan called those Indian motherfxuker's a lot worse!! 555

On that note.
I've been pretty sick with pnuemonia, tried going back to work but out again. Feeling better but lingering.
Worse is I am completely deaf in my right ear. Doctor is concerned and put me on steroids.

She said they may make me "amped and edgy"
I told her I'm from Boston, I'm already amped and edgy 555

[marc26]

Not a bad flight but funny happening.

Me and Dupree were flying to Portland one of those small planes.
He was up front and I was in the back.
Plane all boarded, close to leave and this backpacker gets on and sits next to me and smells like cow shit!
I immediately raise my hand and tell the hostess to move me because this kid stinks.
She was a bit shocked and looked at the kid, I told him he stunk like shit and should take a shower before flying.

They moved me 555