Seattle Port Authority Sucks
After an uneventful Alaska Air flight from Reno to Seattle (and a nice Mount St. Helens flyby), we landed early only to learn that the jetway was broken and could not be brought out to the plane. With this message we embarked on a tedious and somewhat scary journey to nowhere.
At various times we were told that the jetway was broken, that we would be using stairs from the front, stairs from the back, that management was on their way to move the jetway (what did the plan to do, order it to move?), that a breaker in the jetway would be reset, and so forth. The plane was pushed back twice, 10 or 12 feet each time.
People were beginning to freak out as they realized that we were basically trapped inside and that they couldn’t get us out even though the plane was intact and we were at the gate. They could have moved us to another gate 5 minutes into the affair. How hard would it be to figure this out? I am sure that the average gorilla could have figured this out without too much difficulty.
Don’t they have a contingency plan for something as simple as this? What would these buffoons do if there was a real emergency?
I have to question the competency of all involved in this debacle; I will be sending a detailed rant to the Seattle Port Authority in the near future. As far as I can tell, Alaska Air is blameless here.
Overall, management of all types at Sea-Tac is in disarray. Incompetence at the local TSA office means that we have the nation’s longest average waiting times for the security screening. With this event, I see that these people are actively preventing us from getting on to or getting off planes! I guess they think that the airport is there to sell us overpriced food and drink, not to help us to actually go somewhere.
Seattle Airport has some serious problems. Maybe it’s a reflection of the many serious problems that the City of Seattle has. Of all the airports I’ve flown in and out of (many of them) Seattle Airport is the most unprofessional, most unorganized, with the longest wait lines by far. Also, Seattle is the only airport I’ve ever been to, both nationally and internationally, where the luggage-checkers are allowed to check passengers luggage without the passanger being present. There is a big machine where they take the luggage, put it through the machine, then check it by hand afterwards, t hen put it onto the planes. They will not allow an yone to watch them do the process. They told me to go away, t hat I am not allowed to stand by and watch. When I arrived at my destination, I found my luggage had been opened and repacked with some small things crushed and broken, and I found that all of my nice lace underwear had been stolen! Amazing! They guys who checked my luggage who work for the Seattle Airport actually stole several pairs of my panties! Absurd.
Comment by Vecquin — 10/5/2004 @ 12:19 pm