PHOENIX — Phoenix residents went through great lengths to make it home Monday after Southwest Airlines canceled over 2,000 flights over the weekend.
Laura Vasquez was forced to travel from Austin to San Antonio, spend the night at a hotel and go through a detour through LAX after her Sunday flight was postponed.
“Everything was fine, I was in Austin with my friends just doing all the touristy things - never thought I would not make it to work Monday,” she said.
It wasn’t until Vasquez was at the luggage check-in counter at the Austin-Bergstrom International Airport that she said she was notified that her Sunday morning flight was canceled and that no other flights would resume that day.
Vasquez searched for a ticket through another airline but said they were all more than $1,000. It was something she wasn’t prepared to pay.
One of her friends found her a ticket for $250 through American Airlines but the flight departed from San Antonio International Airport. Vasquez said her friend drove her there.
“This is ridiculous, people need to go home, they need to work,” Vasquez recalls thinking when she learned that her flight was among thousands the carrier has canceled. “I understand it was a holiday weekend, but not everyone that flew through Southwest had the day off… I was one of those people.”
Southwest Airlines blamed the nationwide cancellations to air traffic control issues, bad weather and staffing shortages.
“I’m not buying that,” said Ron Steckel who said he spent more than $1,500 on a new flight, hotel and food to make it back to the Valley Monday. “A lot of people aren’t buying that I think it’s about labor.”
After seeing the long lines at a California airport, Steckel said he called customer service to get his flight booked and situated, but he said he waited more than two hours “just to get connected.”
The massive cancellations also had an effect on other airlines as passengers were looking for rebooking flights.
“There were about 40 people that were trying to jump from other flights on ours from Southwest that were on stand-by,” Jennifer Simler explained. She was traveling with American Airlines along with her husband and baby.
Simler and her family were traveling from Las Vegas to Idaho, but their connection was canceled. They were forced to spend a night in Phoenix. Luckily, they stayed with their family.
“We fly out tomorrow at 7 a.m. and get back home probably at midnight after we drive home,” Ryan Simler said. “It’s going to be another 36 hours.”
Southwest Airlines said the company is adjusting flight schedules but affected passengers want more than their refund.
“I wish they could just issue a whole entire nationwide apology that had booked through Southwest,” Vasquez said.
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