Anyone having flight cancellations this weekend???
Yes.
If you do not have to travel to Florida for the next week - don’t. This hurricane will hit somewhere in Florida and there will be power outages, gas shortages, flooding and inconvenience in big areas.
Just talked to my daughter and she is thinking of getting OUT of Florida. For the last hurricane she evacuated to NJ and was glad she did, except she spent 3 hours on the tarmac trying to get back to Florida (and college) at the end of the evacuation.
It’s not going to be a fun weekend down there. They still don’t know how far up the coast it will hit (Daytona? Jacksonville?)
3 of us in my office are all headed to different parts of FL this weekend!
@bookworm
Where were your cancellations and when?
Most airlines are already waiving change fees.
I was flying to Chicago for a shower for future DIL.
The airlines don’t make it easy . When I asked about shifting to a return date on Wednesday, “sure, but will cost you $200”.
Airlines said they will let me know if my flights cancelled, but still no word.
I called many times, including 2:00 a.m. By 6:00 a.m., I said I can’t believe you don’t consider Sunday and Monday to be on travel advisory list. While my flight not officially cancelled, this woman gave me credit for a future flight. If I hadn’t called every few hours, I would have to Chicago early tomorrow but then been stuck.
I have to put in a good word for Delta. My son and I were scheduled to fly out to Europe Monday from an airport that looked like it might be directly under the NOAA hurricane prediction path on Monday (that was last night’s prediction, it’s slowed down now). Last night I called Delta and although it took 45 minutes on hold before it was my turn to be helped, when the agent did come on the line she could not have been more helpful or kind. They changed our flight without hesitation to Saturday instead and said if I changed my mind or the hurricane shifted path to just call back and they’d change again - no fees for any of this. And these were their inexpensive nonrefundable tickets and I’m not a frequent enough Delta flyer to have any frequent flyer status with them, so it was just good service on their part.
Hoping this doesn’t end up causing travel disruptions. And that everyone’s trips go well.
My daughter in the VI just got her power back tonight. There are several areas that still do not have power. As most homes work off of cisterns, if there is no power there is no water. There are lot of home that are roofed with blue tarps from two years ago.
This hurricane is unpredictable. Definitely be proactive. The tropical storm that was going to miss them turned and ran straight at them and turned into a hurricane while over the islands.
This storm has been stronger than the Sahara Dust Layer that has very dry air and weakens systems. Until she moved there I had no idea that the SDL existed and how it affects weather. If you would like to see an animated forecast of the layer - http://www.myfoxhurricane.com/saharan_dust_car.html You can see the next influx of dark brown has a pocket underneath. That is an area to keep an eye on for the future.
We’re driving the slingshot from Austin to Pensacola Beach. we’re leaving Saturday but taking a few days so won’t arrive until Monday evening. Just hope it doesn’t reform in the Gulf. Guess we’ll bring rain gear this trip!
Delta tried to “upgrade” us on the return flight to economy comfort seats we don’t like (no place to put your stuff in front of you), and a center seat, so I called and got my original seats in steerage back 
They said they are adding more flights outta there in upcoming days, so if we need to change our flights again, we may be able to, but where we will be the cell service is terrible for my AT&T. They have Verizon so hopefully can get through. There is a priority phone # and so far, the several times I’ve had to call in the past few days, I fortunately didn’t wait on hold more than a few minutes, which is a minor miracle.
I also adjusted the car rental to include their re-fueling (which we normally never do) so we don’t have to deal with long lines at the gas station to top off the tank. For $20 or so it is one less thing to worry about.
The good news in all of this is that I discovered (never knew this) last week that if a fare drops more than 24 hrs after you book a flight, while you can’t get a refund, the airline will put the credit in your account (once per itinerary) for the difference. We have a ridiculously overpriced fare for Thanksgiving, and I had noticed that the fare dropped by $158 ($79/ticket) several days after we booked, but figured I was outta luck. When an agent later told me I could, if it dropped again, get a credit-- it happened today, so I got credit in our Delta accounts for $110 ($55/ticket). Not quite as good as the $158, but good enough! I’ll take it!
Well, with the storm slowing down, maybe we didnt need to leave our friends a day early as we now are. But spending 3-4 days in the rain doesn’t sound like fun.
We are trying to decide what to do. We are just below the center of “the cone” as of now. I look into flights to places we have friends and family and they are all sold out already. I may call and see if they will be adding any flights. Normally we don’t leave but this time DH said he’s not worried about the storm but wouldn’t mind missing the power outage and the pain of having his mom come stay with us.
In the meantime we are going to see the Rilling Stones tonight so storm prep will be on hold for a few hours! We booked a car to drive us so we don’t have to waste our precious gas.
Weather has been beautiful, except for the standard (typical) afternoon summer rainshower. Still glad we decided to head back a day early though the weather will be fine here. An old HS friend lives an hour away and happens to be planning to be at the airport and probably on the same concourse as we at the same time. So looking forward to a visit with her at the airport!
Had a heck of a time getting our nephew to La Guardia from Charlotte NC yesterday. It finally took off. We were told it was ripple effect from hurricane. Checked into our historic hotel in Ashville NC last night and saw the hotel was getting slammed with late reservations booked by hurricane “refugees.”