Situations like this are WONDERFUL for my business! Those who can afford it hear about situations like this and vow to never fly on an airline again.

There are HUGE liability issues with "just getting a bus" and without a gate agent or 2 to watch the pax after deplaining.. then who is liable for the pax? what if someone falls in the terminal.... lots of issues here.. most of shouldn't be handled by the flight crew.. they should be handled by competent management
If company says no... and you do yes... you better make sure nothing happens(like a bus crash or old lady slip or something) because the company will hang you out to dry in a civil case.

besides.. you big babbys... The crews regularly spend more then 6 hours on the planes and live to tell about it. If they timed out then that was Very ****ty day for the pilots too. Darn.. Your knees are cramped by the 60lbs of crap that you pass off as a "personal item". Get on a treadmill so you can fit in the seat without an extension. sit down, shutup and drink your free booze. Heading across the atlantic on a full 757 is hardly more comfortable.

oh... and I would have probably tried to walk off...

Hmmmm. You might be onto something.

Lets take, for just a moment, the other side of the sit.

OPS sees a divert on Flight XXX to MSP from Houston. TRACON on MSP says, may be a 'window' to get the flight in, so be on '10 minutes to airborne notice'.....

Their available options are:

1) Go with the flow. Keep pax onboard, fuel is OK for a re-dispatch to MSP. Crew has another 65 minutes to takoff prior to timeout. (Least cost scenario). And besides, this plan has worked exactly like this twice this month. It was last flight of the day, so no further impact on this plane and crew. (Remember this, it's important).

2) Plan 1B. Same as above except maybe OPS should get started on a Plan 2 in case Plan 1 doesn't work tonight. This will involve waking someone up who can approve spending the airline money for the Bus.

3) Plan 2, as described in a previous post.

The 'last flight' syndrome'. Well known for potential abuse. Everyone (including OPS) is at the end of a very long day. Remember the American MD80 that aquaplaned thru the antennas at the end of the runway after a landing in a thunderstorm and long delay getting in? The (unspoken) pressure to get to the last destination; and all the 'ramifications' of not making it. Planes and people out of place for the morning. Pax that will need a place to stay other than their destination. That particular flights' Plan B was to return all the way to Dallas. No 'financial' impact if they did that. Remember the departure and destination thing?

Sorry, maybe it isn't so obvious to the 'outside', but having BTDT, it is a subtle and insidious pressure in everyday operations.

Liability for putting people on a bus (common carrier) are exactly the same as the flight. The crew would have been perfectly capable of walking the pax thru the ramp, gate and terminal. I did forget to mention one thing. EVERYONE has to go along. One pax saying no to the bus re-route would have undone the entire deal. As a pax? I would have gone for the bus. All I care about is getting there, and getting off this damn sardine can. And I can sleep for an hour on the way there.

I've got no problem with any of that for a given period of time - probably tops of 2 hours with my children. Longer without.

3 hours is probably the extent to my politeness without children. I say with/without because my understanding from other news stories and this one was there were infants on board. This makes for a miserable situation for everyone since infants are going to cry. It's all they have really.

Not to mention that as soon as one of these moms starts to get dehydrated - if she's breast feeding she's going to have trouble providing for the kid.

Yes, but the plane gets serviced on each stop.

The bathroom was full, the plane had not been serviced. I assume the engines were not running (to save fuel).

So it was hot and smelly. People were irritable. Children were on the plane and simply can't be expected to sit in a seat for six hours under those conditions.

Besides, I don't think the flight crews are locked on the plane for six hours with a toilet full of $h!t and the engines turned off.

This flight crew should be...

Mikester, I agree.

Some sort of a time limit that is tied to the stage length of the flight.

Common (or obviously not-so-common) sense.

I have not been able to get any 'insider' info about this incident, it's not a circle I run in, and I'm sure no one is talking at the moment. But what exactly went on WILL come out as soon as someone loses their job.

Sidney;

Read back a page or two. The crew didn't do this.

I suspect someone on that plane will lose their job, even if the orders were coming from above.

ok.. so it was in green.. meaning it was just for fun... but since you bit! Some days its better.. some worse... i wouldn't wish that 6 hours on the ground to anyone i know.. and i think it was a major f up... but its not torture

"I suspect someone on that plane will lose their job" nope... 100$ says that wont happen.

This captain should absolutely be taken offline or sent back to the right seat.. Scott, you have to agree, you, or I, would have never let it get this far. You would have called a CP or somebody to get action. They said the DL rampers were there to help but EXJ denied their help. They also said that they tried to get a bus, but the weather was too bad.

And this plane has NO built in door stairs, so unless they had a stairway, people would have had to jump down, or go out over the wings.

If I was on this plane as a pax, I would have absolutely pulled the emer doors. I still simply cant believe no one called the cops, news, etc. amazing..

Don't all comm airports have a set of stairs?

Not really, depends on what type of aircraft they service. Ive been to many airports with the CRJ that didnt have stairs.

Huh. I woulda thought that was something they kept around just in case.

I'm amazed that a smoker didn't melt down and run screaming towards the emergency exits...

Unless you have weak flag waving company cheerleaders for CP...

One other thing:
the flight crew is getting paid to sit there, it's their job and the only place they have to be is home after their day is over.
When I fly it's to get somewhere to do something. I rarely fly for pleasure, it's almost always for business. Going somewhere to do something that has to be done.
Every minute spent trapped on a plane is counter-productive to that end.
So not only is it uncomfortable and cramped and frustrating, it is preventing me from accomplising a very important task.

pay is per "flight hour"... so unless the plane is moving under its own power we dont get paid.. We babysit for free. So when you hear "he makes 50$ an hour" Think that for that hour flight he had to get to the airport an hour early and get the plane ready free of charge. When the door opens at the destination the pay stops until it closes again. Thats why we dont like delays ether. An 8 hour duty day might only pay 4 hours. So practically he only made 25 an hour even though 1\2 the work is before you leave the gate.

Home? you mean some crappy town's motel to grab as much sleep as you can before you wake up early and do it all again for the 4th day in a row?

Sounds like a crappy job. I love airplanes and flying - I'd never work for an airline. Dad worked for AirTran (I think that's who it was) when they had flight engineers (up until about 2001 or so I believe) and he hates even the thought of getting on an airline.

Brilliant. I am going to remember that!

Pretty well spot on.

Hey Mike, I just got home late last night. Did 11 days in a row out on the road, not 3-4 like Air above. Most of you guys in back have no idea what we go through to have our life of flying.

Joe A