We were scheduled to depart Los Angeles at 1:00AM on May 14th. The Singapore Air flight boarded on time, but we sat on the runway for an unusually long time. After we’d waited about 45 minutes the pilot announced over the intercom that “(They’d) spotted a fuel leak in number two engine and were investigating.”
15 minutes later, he announced that “Repairs are estimated to take two hours, please stay seated and thanks for your patience.”
I think it’s important to explain about my seat on the plane, or, as I came to think of it: my cell. The plane was a 747 Megatop 400 — a big plane, to be sure. There must have been 300 or more people on the flight, but the seats were not designed for someone of my stature. By the time the pilot explained that we had a additional two-hour wait on the runway, I had already decided that the 14 hour flight was going to be miserable, the three extra hours on the plane were just icing on gravy.
After two hours, the leak had been repaired, but a problem remained in the system, and so, the flight was postponed until 12 noon May 14. Relieved as I was that the pilot chose to have the plane repaired rather than risk the crossing, I was also annoyed at the delay. The precious hours of my vacation were ticking away in California.
Singapore Air arranged ground transportation, hotel rooms and meals for us. The problem was, there were only one or two shuttle busses running at 4:00AM, and they weren’t very big. We spent nearly 3 hours outside waiting to get on the shuttles to go to the hotel. It was while trying to get on the shuttle that I discovered that, unlike the British, Chinese people do not believe in standing in an orderly queue. Utter chaos ensued each time the shuttle bus returned as men, women and children fought to get on the shuttle.
Much the same experience awaited us as we spent another hour in the hotel lobby trying to check in. Like a scene from Night of the Living Dead, the passengers from the plane senselessly, almost instinctively, crowded towards the front desk, attempting to get at the one, overworked and totally unprepared graveyard-shirt hotel clerk.
Our free breakfast was an all-you-can-eat breakfast buffet from 8AM to 9:30 AM, so we had to hurry for our meal. We couldn’t clean up much since our luggage was already stowed on the plane. Our flight was rescheduled at 12noon, and we knew it would be a similar nightmare returning to the airport, so we only had time to catch a shower and about an hour’s sleep, then we made our own way back to the airport.
We arrived back at LAX at around 11:00AM where we discovered that the flight was further delayed until 1:30PM. We settled into the airport lounge for an anticipated 2 hour wait.