Nightmare at O'Hare

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Hello, I'm finally online after a frustrating trip through O'Hare Airport from Oregon to North Carolina on Tuesday.

First, we were delayed two hours in Portland. They said the problem was "weather and ATC problems" at O'Hare.

After liftoff, and having a window seat, I started carefully observing outside for tell-tale cloud formations of thunderstorms. There were virtually none.

Cloud cover in the Chicago area was broken. There appeared to be two layers, with the upper layer very broken, and the lower level more broken. There was too much cover to be called "partly cloudy".

Finally, after arriving in Chicago, I had the opportunity to tour the terminals on the their trains. The whole airport was bone dry. No sign of water anywhere except the drinking fountains.

Asking the United ticket agents about it, they said in Chicago that ATC (Air Traffic Control) had canceled the flights. No mention of weather. I asked them about the weather, and they said, oh yeah, it rained, too.

Now, I know this is all anecdotal, and I've seen little or no mention of this in the media. Could anybody from Chicago alert us about the weather on Tuesday? I would've checked it myself - but after spending all night watching TV in O'Hare - and being a day late arriving at my destination, I worked and slept the whole day.

Also, anybody heard about the "radar" problems in Minnesota on Wednesday?

Radar, hmmm.

Jolly likes busses better.

-- Jollyprez (jolly@prez.com), June 24, 1999

Answers

I work at O'Hare and have for several years. It is not uncommon for flights to be delayed even if there is not any bad weather apparent at the airport. If there are storms in the surronding areas, (midwest), and beyond. This will affect traffic flow, you must remember that there are flights coming in from all around the world, and these flights may have to deal with these weather patterns which may cause deversions or delays which throws their schedules alloff, which in turn effect you. It may be frustrating for you, but trust me, it effects a great many people on the ground as well.

oboy

-- oboy (oboy@oboy.com), June 24, 1999.


Jollyprez, you were stuck in Portland? Was it raining? No? That would be unusual ;-) Busses & trains may be safer now thru rollover and how far beyond ... we've heard some interesting stories about airline safety being compromised by the "upgrade" process.

-- Ashton & Leska in Cascadia (allaha@earthlink.net), June 24, 1999.

What do you want to know? I live 15 minutes east of Minneapolis. According to the local TV reports the night it happened, it was directly caused by "the upgrade of the ATC systems, according to airport management and Nortwest Airlines representatives."

Funny, the NEXT DAY the answer (in the paper) became "some equipment had been moved into a different room, and that caused the failure." That's interesting, because the failure (the disappearance of flight data from the ATC screen) EXACTLY matched all the OTHER failures around the country recently.

But it was "just from moving the equipment". Okay, I'll bite. Won't YOU?

-- Dennis (djolson@pressenter.com), June 24, 1999.


Oboy,

Well, this was certainly unusual. 40+ flights & several THOUSAND passengers left stranded is NOT a common occurance, I suspect.

Jolly HAS a bus.

-- Jollyprez (jolly@prez.com), June 25, 1999.


What is your point you idiot doomer. Get a life shit for brains.

-- Y2K Pro (2@641.com), June 25, 1999.


Scatfun time for the PRO, again.

-- Carlos (riffraff1@cybertime.net), June 25, 1999.

Actually, Pro, I'm relatively moderate around here. HOWEVER, we have two major airport outages in the same week, costing airlines & passengers millions of dollars.

We get conflicting reports from govspeak.com about the causes. That error has messed up my whole week; I'm getting a little pissed.

Pro, you hang around, and regurgitate government press releases, and happy face op-ed pieces with no data to backup their optimism. Then you offer little or no analyses [sic] of your own.

Have you ever worked in the software industry?

I do.

Have you ever worked for the US government or DOD?

I have.

Have you ever worked on a software project for the US Government?

I have.

Can you read English? Can you read past the first paragraph of a text? Then I suggest you download the Senate report on Y2K, and read the damn thing.

I challenge you to read the WHOLE THING! Sure, it's government, too. So take it with a grain of salt.

In the meantime, I, for one, would appreciate a constructive criticism, and not a label.

Jolly

-- Jollyprez (jolly@prez.com), June 25, 1999.


The real Y2K Pro has never used a common profanity on this forum. Another bogus posting...

-- Y2K Pro (2@641.com), June 25, 1999.

Interesting what's going on here.

1) There are flight delays fairly often, of varying degree. They're often caused by multple things (like equipment failure AND weather). So let's ignore the weather part, doesn't fit our fixation.

2) Equipment breaks down fairly often, also for multiple reasons. Let's ignore all but the *possible* reason of an ATC upgrade (we still don't know).

3) Upgrades happen now and then, also for multiple reasons. Let's ignore any reasons except upgrades for y2k compliance.

4) y2k compliance upgrades don't always go smoothly, though they do most of the time. Let's ignore all those that go smoothly.

5) We are left where we started -- this must be a y2k problem whether it is or not. Easy when you know how.

6) Now let's project. O'Hare had some delays the other day. THEREFORE y2k will be a disaster. QED.

Do you think anyone but the most committed fanatic will be fooled by this chain of irrationality at all? Please.

-- Flint (flintc@mindspring.com), June 25, 1999.


Flint, *I LIVE HERE*. (In the MPLS area)

Facts iz facts.

1) The airport people SAID (DIRECTLY) that the failure was from the upgrade.

2) The FAA has SAID (DIRECTLY) that it's upgrading ALL ATC systems nationwide with "new" Y2K-compliant systems.

3) The systems have been exhibiting the SAME EXACT symptoms.

Pollys iz pollys, I guess....

-- Dennis (djolson@pressenter.com), June 25, 1999.



y2kpro, you never use common profanity??that wasn't you who called me smegma eater?maybe I should remove mysogyny from your character profile!

-- zoobie (zoobiezoob@yahoo.com), June 25, 1999.

Y2k pro,

Glad I found you on this thread---whewww- hey, I had your mother last night, she wanted me to say hi!!

-- pushin@stoole (dciinc@aol.com), June 25, 1999.


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