What's your worst flying experience?

Ernabr said:
4. Flying back to London just before Christmas 2013 Dad booked me in business class on BA. Taxing to the runway the pilot failed to turn on the taxiway and the right wing hit a building. Stayed overnight in a hotel courtesy of BA and only left the next evening. Messed up our pre-Christmas plans in a big way. The fairly new 747 was scrapped.
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Ouch! :(
 
Some absolute horror stories in this thread. Worst I've ever experienced is some heavy turbulence leading to a couple of attempts at the runway before finally succeeding.
 
Ernabr said:
Flying back to London just before Christmas 2013 Dad booked me in business class on BA. Taxiing to the runway the pilot failed to turn on the taxiway and the right wing hit a building. Stayed overnight in a hotel courtesy of BA and only left the next evening. Messed up our pre-Christmas plans in a big way. The fairly new 747 was scrapped.
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First Flight
30 May 1990
 
Qatar airlines.

The family and I were heading to the uk a few years and we decided to fly Qatar. Unfortunately the credit card I booked the flights with was cloned a month before, and subsequently cancelled, but the airline refused to accept the replacement card even though the fare had been paid.

Ended up missing the flight and having to overnight in jnb (at our expense). Flew out the next day.
 
Once I had a flight from Durban to CPT cancelled. Everyone was moved to a flight 6hrs later. I received no notification and found out when I went to the airport to check in. Had to choose between waiting at the airport for 7+hrs or going back home 50km away.
 
Forum Reader said:
Once I had a flight from Durban to CPT cancelled. Everyone was moved to a flight 6hrs later. I received no notification and found out when I went to the airport to check in. Had to choose between waiting at the airport for 7+hrs or going back home 50km away.
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Reminds me of another bad experience. Flight from Lanseria to Cape Town on flysafair.
Scheduled 9am take off...

Delayed... delayed... delayed... with no info about why, or what was going to be done while later flights boarded and took off...

We eventually took off at about 4pm, having sat in the departure lounges for 7 ****ing hours of our planned 2 day weekend in CT.
 
Flying from Accra, Ghana to Lagos, Nigeria. Flight is supposed to depart at 2pm Sunday. Checked in my luggage, got my boarding pass, went through immigration, got my passport stamped and now sitting at the boarding gate. 2pm comes and goes and no plane. At 2:30 they say flight is cancelled. Everyone rushes the gate desk asking what happens now? Airline staff just shrug and say go to the ticket office and ask them.

Had to go back through immigration and get passport "unstamped." Now there's 50+ of us all shouting at the ticket office employee. Long story short they say they have one flight later but only a few seats. People start having breakdowns, one autistic child starts throwing a tantrum in the middle of the airport, just chaos. This is my first time flying in West Africa, I'm all on my own so I'm just like wtf do I do now.

I contacted one of my colleagues who had dropped me off at the airport and explained everything. He said don't worry we'll make a plan. Collected me from the airport, took me for a meal all the while the office contacted their travel agent who got me onto the next flight which only had a "few seats" free. Ended up landing in Nigeria about 3 hours later.

As I arrived back at the airport all the other stranded people were getting on a bus being sent to a hotel for the night. They were only able to arrange a flight the next day.
 
Stickfigure said:
Flying from Accra, Ghana to Lagos, Nigeria. Flight is supposed to depart at 2pm Sunday. Checked in my luggage, got my boarding pass, went through immigration, got my passport stamped and now sitting at the boarding gate. 2pm comes and goes and no plane. At 2:30 they say flight is cancelled. Everyone rushes the gate desk asking what happens now? Airline staff just shrug and say go to the ticket office and ask them.

Had to go back through immigration and get passport "unstamped." Now there's 50+ of us all shouting at the ticket office employee. Long story short they say they have one flight later but only a few seats. People start having breakdowns, one autistic child starts throwing a tantrum in the middle of the airport, just chaos. This is my first time flying in West Africa, I'm all on my own so I'm just like wtf do I do now.

I contacted one of my colleagues who had dropped me off at the airport and explained everything. He said don't worry we'll make a plan. Collected me from the airport, took me for a meal all the while the office contacted their travel agent who got me onto the next flight which only had a "few seats" free. Ended up landing in Nigeria about 3 hours later.

As I arrived back at the airport all the other stranded people were getting on a bus being sent to a hotel for the night. They were only able to arrange a flight the next day.
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I was in Liberia when ebola was getting bad. Decided I'm outta here but it took me 5 days to get a flight and it was basically the last one out to Nairobi before the airspace closed. Stayed in my room all week and got to the airport early and my fsck it was like the fall of Saigon. Absolute chaos. Most folk didn't have a flight but there were hundreds of people crammed into the airport trying to find one. And of course everyone is schitting themselves in the confined spaces with ebola on the go, it was a horrendous experience. And of course, among the bedlam I even had some passport guy trying to bribe me to let me through. Gotta love West Africa.
 
Just got off a nice Airlink flight with some annoying bashes and drops for about 45 seconds. If you weren't holding onto your coffee mug it was gone lol...
 
Decided to try parasailing at Sun City with some friends.

The harness caught my left nut somehow, spent the entire experience trying to lift myself up to lessen the pressure and pain, couldn't get things normalised.
But still a good memory somehow.
 
A friend / colleague was flying me from Jo'burg to Potch in a regularly hired Cessna 182, turbulence was nauseating, Potch is known for it.
Landing there was :sick:

I'm not a pilot.
On the way back, he suddenly let go of the steering yoke and declared; it's all yours, Brian 😰
(Edit: wasn't turbulent at the time)
 
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Was on a flight once where the person next to me on a 4hr flight declined the inflight meal and proceeded to eat her balut eggs. Luckily the person in the row in front of me threw up in the aisle so the air hostess dealt with the traveller directly. That smell wafted for the next hour.
 
Friend of my husband was flying from PE to Jhb one evening. Sat in the lounge, working and having a drink or 2(?). As the flight started boarding he was paged, had to go back to the SAA counter for some reason. Back through security, sorted whatever had to be sorted, rushed through security again. Rushed to the gate, woman just took his boarding pass, chatting to her colleague. Just after takeoff he noticed they're flying along the coast, not northwards. He was on the Durban flight. Apparently a huge stink was raised about the procedures at PE.
 
quovadis said:
Was on a flight once where the person next to me on a 4hr flight declined the inflight meal and proceeded to eat her balut eggs. Luckily the person in the row in front of me threw up in the aisle so the air hostess dealt with the traveller directly. That smell wafted for the next hour.
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One is captive the plane haha! I try to remove all uncertainty when travelling - but even flying bc on a recent long haul I had some guy farting and snoring so loudly in the cubicle next to me it ruined the flight. It's luck of the draw always.
 
This one must be quite old...
Guy was sitting having a beer or two at the old Nelspruit airfield. Only scheduled flights were to Durban and Johannesburg. Two Jetstreams on the apron - busy time! The PA system is a speaker on a pole. Everyone is chiling under the veranda, drinking something cold in the Lowveld'd humis heat. "Blah blah blah blah" goes the speaker. Guy finishes his beer and follow the other passengers the few yeards to the plane. Put his laptop bag etc on the trolley and settles in his seat. Engines start up. Airhostess start the safety demo "Welcome on board our flight to Johannesburg..." Guy immediately get up - "I'm going to Durban!"
Pilot was not impressed I guess.
 
The Darkness said:
Was thinking about how epic this must have been. Those cyclones out there are proper - and that's a big ocean. Nice! This is what we live for right?
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100% right. Although at the time I was scared out of my mind. Had to keep calm though for the family. But staring out the window over to the horizon watching the clouds roll in 😨😨
 
WollieVerstege said:
100% right. Although at the time I was scared out of my mind. Had to keep calm though for the family. But staring out the window over to the horizon watching the clouds roll in 😨😨
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Luckily a TBM930 can outrun a cyclone hopefully, but watching a furious herd of rhinos chasing you down must have felt epic.
 
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