Delta Connection - Was It Minneapolis or Was It Hell?

May 22, 2018 

 

Today’s flight adventure began with our arrival to the National Car Rental garage at the Dwight Eisenhower Airport in Wichita, Kansas. Though our Delta flight wasn’t scheduled to depart until 4:54 pm, we turned in our rental vehicle at around 2:30 pm. Since we arrived early, I changed out of my suit and into some comfortable travel clothing prior to checking in for our flight. We still made it through airport security with plenty of time to spare, so we found a place to sit in an airport bar. Shortly after being seated, we learned that our flight out of Wichita to Minneapolis was delayed 17 minutes. Okay, no problem there.

Right around the time our food arrived, we received another delay notification, this time departure was changed to 6:04 pm, a one-hour, ten-minute delay. Okay, we were still good for our Minneapolis connection, no problem. Flight takes off and flies to Minneapolis without any further delay.

Upon arrival at Minneapolis, even though the flight was more than an hour behind schedule, there was no Gate ready to accept the plane. It is now 10 minutes before time to start boarding the Minneapolis flight. Okay, our connection is with Delta, so no worries. I’m sure Delta flights are assigned gates in the same general area.

After sitting on the tarmac for about 20 minutes, we finally docked at Concourse A. Since the flight to our final destination in Hartford, Connecticut had now been boarding for 10 minutes, I decided to check my phone for the Gate assignment to save time looking for a monitor in the terminal. Might as well use the time waiting to get off the plane to my advantage. Remember how I said we would be parked at Concourse A? Well, the Hartford flight was boarding at Gate G1, “G” as in golf. I’m still not terribly concerned because flights start boarding 40 minutes before departure time so we still had 30 minutes to get there.

After getting off the plane with all the rude passengers jumping to the front of the plane because their tight schedules were more important than those ahead of them, I search for the path to Concourse G. It turns out there was a tram that ran from Concourse A to Concourses C, D, E, F, and G. So, on the tram we go. We get to the Concourse C stop and there is a mention of a “Skyway to Concourse G”, but nothing to say it was The Stop for Concourse G. So, we stay on the tram expecting the stop for Concourse G to follow the stops for Concourses D, E, and F. It didn’t work that way, so we returned to the Stop for Concourse C to seek out the “Skyway to Concourse G”.

Having found the Skyway, we jumped on the multitude of moving sidewalks to make our journey to Concourse G as quick as possible. Fortunately, we were going to Gate G1, which should be the first Gate on Concourse G. That was the numbering scheme I recalled from experiences at many other airports, so why would this one be any different.

Not only was G1 the last Gate in Concourse G, but Concourse G was a long and winding road to seemingly nowhere. There were a number of sizable gaps between certain sections of Concourse G which really messed with our minds as we were trying to get to our Hartford flight. With no time for a restroom break before boarding the plane, we made it to Gate G1 at 8:05 pm. Thank goodness, we could now go to our seats, 25A and 25B which was the two-seat side of the plane. I couldn’t have planned it any better, even though I tried to get Delta Comfort seats when I checked in the day before but there weren’t any available. No problem. Two seats, side-by-side with my wife is a huge win no matter how you look at it.

As we sit in our assigned seats, I noticed 25B was warm and there was a purse under the seat in front. Figuring someone from the previous flight must have left it behind, I turn to see if there is a flight attendant around. As the flight attendant approached, she informed us there is a woman already sitting in 25B who was in the restroom. I showed her my boarding pass which clearly had 25B on it. The flight attendant found a row of empty seats in the very back of the plane on the starboard side, the side with three seats and they were all empty. Instead of asking the woman to move, and I suspect the woman took 25B when she thought no one was assigned either 25A or 25B, the flight attendant offered us the seats in the very back.

For those who have ever flown commercial airlines, the seats in the back are against a bulkhead and can’t be reclined. They aren’t Delta Comfort, so there is no leg room. The guy in front of me is among the shrinking number of passengers who automatically reclines his seat after takeoff even though it is only a 2.5-hour flight. As a result of this nearly Perfect Storm, I find myself recounting this wonderful adventure of flying Delta from Minneapolis to Hartford on my laptop which is digging into my stomach because of the reclined seat in front of me and the seat I’m sitting in that can’t be reclined. Due to the same limitations, I can’t even tilt the screen of the laptop enough to be able to easily read what it is I am writing.

I don’t think my eyes can take the strain of trying to proofread this (oh, seat just reclined a bit more), so I am going to save it like it is and eventually publish this version without editing it. If there are too many problems with it, I’ll perhaps add an edited version later to fulfill my perfectionist needs!

I like Delta when Delta Comfort seating is available, which it always had been before today, but flying without pain was just not in the cards for today. At least I don’t believe there were any cats or dogs that were injured in the creation of this story!