CNN
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It’s the stuff of nightmares. You’re looking to get someplace, you’ve prepped and deliberate and also you’re doing all of your perfect and but you find yourself proper again the place you began.
That’s about what came about to common flyer Bryan Gottlieb and his fellow Air New Zealand passengers on Thursday when their deliberate adventure from Auckland to New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport was once disrupted by means of {an electrical} outage on the airport.
JFK’s Terminal 1 was once closed and one of the crucial flights scheduled to land there needed to be diverted. Some global flights landed at different airports: Newark, Washington Dulles, Boston Logan.
Gottlieb’s flight, ANZ2, became round mid-flight and landed again in Auckland, greater than 16 hours after departing the similar airport. Flight monitoring web site FlightConscious logs a complete flying time of 16 hours and 25 mins, with the aircraft turning again kind of midway via its scheduled adventure.
“I was sleeping pretty soundly, and I woke up with the feeling that I would surely be landing in JFK soon,” Gottlieb mentioned in a message to CNN Travel. Then “the passenger next to me tapped me on the shoulder and said ‘did you know we’re almost back in Auckland?’”
Gottlieb mentioned his fellow passenger gave him the inside track two or 3 hours sooner than the aircraft was once set to land. An announcement concerning the diversion didn’t come till the flight was once virtually again in New Zealand, he mentioned, even supposing “you could see our route on the tracker, and word had spread around.”
He mentioned when the pilot made the announcement, “he acknowledged that part of the decision was based on schedule efficiency for the airline, and that the lack of crew at an airport near JFK would have caused the airline further delays.”
The passengers weren’t satisfied.
“Everyone on that plane would have much preferred to be in any airport in the US, to say nothing of Newark or LaGuardia right in the same general area,” mentioned Gottlieb, a recreation fashion designer who was once headed house from a five-week paintings travel to enroll in the tail finish of his brother’s bachelor birthday party travel.
Air New Zealand mentioned Thursday in a remark to CNN Travel that “diverting to another US port would have meant the aircraft would remain on the ground for several days, impacting a number of other scheduled services and customers.”
At the time, the flight was once nonetheless en direction again to Auckland, and the airline mentioned its staff was once in a position to help its shoppers with rebooking at the subsequent to be had carrier.
“We apologise for the inconvenience and thank our customers for their patience and understanding,” the remark mentioned. CNN reached out to the airline for extra main points on Friday however didn’t instantly pay attention again.
Gottlieb, who lives in New York, spent 8 hours on the airport in Auckland looking forward to his subsequent flight out to Los Angeles, the place he was once set to hook up with JFK. Air New Zealand supplied him with $100 price of meal vouchers, however he didn’t have any success purchasing his manner right into a loyalty membership front room to clean up in Auckland. He hadn’t heard about different repayment on the time he communicated with CNN.
The diverted flight was once Gottlieb’s 2nd strive at getting house. His unique flight again to the States on Monday was once canceled because of the devastating cyclone that struck New Zealand this week. His spouse’s plans to enroll in him for the final two weeks of his keep have been foiled when her flight was once canceled because of airport flooding in Auckland on the finish of January.
With the 16-hour Auckland to Auckland extend, he ignored the bachelor birthday party altogether. As a ways as journeys pass, “it was a wild one for sure!”
Gottlieb mentioned he’s upset with the airline’s reaction “at a corporate level,” however encountered very useful airline body of workers.
“This is certainly the worst travel experience I’ve ever had, but ultimately, these things do happen, and I always try to keep in mind that none of the people I’m interacting with had anything to do with the decisions that delayed me — they’re all just doing their best and they were legitimately kind.”
And New Zealand is considered one of Gottlieb’s favourite puts.
“The people and region are both lovely. I sure do wish it was a little closer though.”
