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Show By Brian Gray SETEPHANIE Shupe is enjoying her two-week visit to Davis County. What she didn't enjoy is her transportation en route. "The airline service left a lot to be desired, "she says with a wry smile. "The trip was a comedy of errors." The comedy began in Richmond, Virginia where 20-year-old Stephanie, a business major at Mary Washington University, was informed that poor weather in Chicago would delay the United Airlines flight for some 40 minutes. Stephanie knows that flight delays are not unusual but she wasn't expecting the resulting foul-up. The airplane finally made the trip to Chicago and it was there that the pilot steered the aircraft into the wrong gate. "Ladies and gentlemen," he intoned, "if you think we went to the wrong gate, you're correct. Let's blame this one on the traffic control tower." But the gate mix-up created another problem for Stephanie. She missed the connecting night to Salt Lake City by a mere two minutes. "That meant I had to line up at the airline's customer service desk," she said. "And due to the delayed departures at O'Hare, the line was ridiculously long." She stood in line for 90 minutes before being "greeted" by the service representative. And what the service representative told her was not good news. "There are no more flights to Salt Lake City tonight," said the woman. "Furthermore, there is no way to fly you to a different city and connect you with Salt Lake City. What you'll have to do is spend the night at a hotel here in Chicago." "Fine!" said Stephanie. "And United Airlines will arrange and pay for the hotel?" "Oh no!" said the airline representative. "We would only do that if our airline was responsible for the delay. But in your case the delay was caused by an air traffic controller. We're not responsible." At this point, Stephanie had another problem. She was carrying car-rying very little cash and as a college student she did not have a credit card. She called the O'Hare Hilton. "Sure we have a room for you," said the hotel clerk. "Will this be cash or credit card?" "I have no cash," said Stephanie. "But I'll give you my father's credit card number." "We can't accept that," said the clerk. Finding there was no room at the inn, Stephanie walked into the hotel restaurant. She would order dinner, she told the receptionist, recep-tionist, but she would have to pay for it with a personal check. "Do you have a bank guarantee card?" asked the woman. So much for dinner! Eventually the hotel agreed to take Stephanie's personal check and by midnight she was safely ensconced in her room. What else could go wrong? How about her luggage? On the following morning her United flight from Chicago left 30 minutes late with two of her bags. No problem except that Stephanie had checked in three bags, not two. "When I got to Salt Lake City, the airline said they had no idea what had happened to the third piece of luggage. So I rooted around at the other luggage carousels and surprisingly found the third piece. Somehow it had been flown in on an American Airlines jet and I was darn lucky I spotted it!" Her worries aren't over yet . . . She still has to return home. But in the meantime she is enjoying the relaxed comfort of Davis County. . Sometimes those friendly skies are down-home friendly friend-ly .. . Other times, the skies are downright comical. |
