We were scheduled to fly from Orlando, to Kansas City, and then on to Indy. Our flight left at 8am from Orlando and we were supposed to be in Indy by 1:45pm. I was actually happy about this schedule because we would have almost a day and a half to be home, get stuff done, and relax.
We start approaching KC, and it's starting to get *really* choppy because of the thunderstorms in the area. The turbulence is so bad that people are getting sick. The pilot comes on and says that they're going to try to land, but if they can't, we're going to Tulsa to refuel because they don't have enough fuel to wait out the storm. So we continue descending and the more we descend, the worse it gets. The flight attendants were chucking bags of pretzels down the aisle for the people who were feeling sick to see if it might help them calm their stomachs (they turned it into a game, we were all laughing, which helped). The pilot comes on after a few minutes and says they're aborting the landing and going to Tulsa. We knew we were going to miss our connection.
So he pulls back up in to the air. It gets better. 20 min later, the pilot comes on and says we're going to OKC. OK, whatever. So we get to OKC and they let the people who's final destination was OKC get off the plane (which makes sense). But they tell the rest of us to stay on. So we wait, and wait, and wait. I get in line for the bathroom and then the flt. attendants get on the speaker and say that everyone has to sit down because we're taking off for KC ASAP.
We fly to KC w/o incident. By the time we get to KC, it's 2pm. None of us has eaten anything but peanuts, pretzels, and 100 cal snack packs since about 7:30am (we flew Southwest). We get off the airplane in KC and go to the gate agent. She says, "Are you the one's going to Indy?" We say "Yes." She hands us boarding passes. We were re-routed to Chicago and then to Indy. She tells us to hurry because the flight boards in 10 min. We're all, "Where can we get something to eat?!" There were sandwich stands in the terminal, so we all stopped to get some sandwiches.
We hop on the flight to Chicago. When we get to Chicago, we realize we have a 4 hour wait for our connection. BIL's in the military, so he went to the USO office to see if we could all get in. Thankfully, they let us in. The USO has couches and such and is way more comfortable than a gate chair. We watched the end of the USA vs. UK match. We went to find some dinner. At dinner, BIL looks up our flight to Indy and it's been delayed by 20 min. Motherfecker.
After dinner, we go to the gate...which is packed. Our plane lands. We board. And then we sit there. And sit, and sit, and sit. I notice it cockpit door is open and I know that planes do not take off with the cockpit door open. The pilot (finally!) comes on and says, "Uh folks, we're waiting for a few more bags to be loaded and then we'll go." We wait for at least another 10 min and then finally we're on our way...
This is getting long, so part 2 is coming up next...