Grounded

Less than three weeks ago, I had to make an urgent hand delivery for a tender submission to Miri. It was rather unexpected since we planned to send the package via courier. However, since we didn’t receive the relevant information in time (2 days before deadline), the only option was for me to hand carry it there. The submission time was Thursday, before 3pm. So I bought tickets to board the low fare airline, AirAsia, to Miri, departing at 7.20am. Arriving at 9.20 that Thursday morning should give me enough time to deliver the package and meet our clients the rest of the day.

The normal air fare would be around RM1000 by Malaysia Airlines but my return flight with AirAsia cost only RM500++. I figured I could help save company’s money this way. Plus, an uncertain tender submission should not cost so much.

I arrived at the Low Cost Carrier Terminal as scheduled. The cabin was only half full so I managed to get a private seat by the window at the right wing portion. I tried to catch a nap as the aircrafts around mine make their way to the runway. The high volume of morning air traffic dragged the flight’s take off time to 8am.

The take off wasn’t quite as smooth but we were fast ascending in mid air nonetheless. There were several notable irregular sounds coming from the engine and wing segment. One was a rather loud mechanical gear sound and the other sounded like someone blowing into a microphone at a constant 30 seconds interval; except it wasn’t coming from the speaker above. It was transmitted through the body of the plane and it seemed to originate from the wing segment. That went on throughout the ascend.

I was so sleepy and dying to start my hibernating process that I didn’t give the sounds much thought.

[intercom *ding…]

“…please fasten your seatbelt, put your seat upright and stow you table to its original position.”

The announcement woke me up, ‘Oh great, bad weather. Just what I need’ I thought.

Heck, I’ve been through a few notoriously rough plane rides to hate this situation. 8.15am was the time on my watch and I went ‘yup, we’re not in the right altitude to dodge these nasty clouds’

Another five minutes passed before I heard the pilot say ‘Cabin Crew, please be seated for the landing’

What the ….. we’re landing? Now? How long have I been asleep? It’s only twenty minutes after take off. We can’t be landing now? We must still be above KL!!!

I looked out the window and saw a familiar sight; the runway I saw 25 minutes ago. Hey, there’s LCCT, AGAIN!

[Tires screeching, jet engine buzzing violently] “Welcome to LCC Terminal, Kuala Lumpur International Airport. Please remain seated until the seatbelt sign is switched off. Please make sure all electronic devices; especially your cell phones are switched off until you are in the terminal building. Please bring all your hand luggage with you when leaving the aircraft and wait in the departure hall for further notice” came the announcement.

‘Ok, we’re really back where we started 30 minutes ago. What the hell happened. Why is everybody so calm and not curious at all? Clearly I’m the only one missing the vital info’ I thought.

As I approached the exit door I asked the flight attendant “Uhm, excuse me. I missed the announcement earlier, but what happened?”

“Hydraulics problem” she said calmly, conveniently smiled and turned the other way.

“Oh, ok” I replied. The answer was simple and precise enough for my tired and sleepy brain so I left it at that.

Walking down the stairs slowly got me out of daze. I looked back toward the plane as everybody was making their way to the departure hall.

‘How bizarre is this?’ I asked myself.



I gazed up at the crimson morning sky and these words rang in my ears ‘there and back again’

As soon as everyone was in the terminal building, the engineers opened up the plane’s belly and started fixing God-knows-what. Here’s a thought: What if they caused another problem while trying to fix the faulty hydraulics? Don’t they have spare planes for situations like this? It’s not exactly a bicycle which can be used right after it’s fixed, or is this AirAsia’s idea of a bicycle?

Of all the planes parked here that morning, all took off without a glitch but mine.



Chronologically,

9.30am : They announced that they were still unable to determine the flight departure time. After waiting for an hour, that was the best they can tell us.

9.31am: We were made to wait indefinitely.

10.30am : They finally announced that departure was scheduled at 11.45am. It was a temporary relief since that would enable me to deliver the package less than 15 minutes before closing time, 3pm, tentatively of course. Provided there are no more unknown glitches surfacing.

10:45am: They distributed 500ml of mineral water, small packs of Swiss roll cake and a bun with traces of sardine paste in the middle; rationed like butter during World War II.

11.30am: We boarded the plane.

11.50am: Take off.

Everything went as per ammended schedule, after more than four hours' delay, with an uncertain flight's fate. Praying mode: 'ON'

Soon after we were at cruising altitude, the flight attendants were out with snacks to be purchased. They’re basically instant noodles, sandwiches and packet drinks sold three times the normal price. Things do get increasingly pricy with altitude. They should really teach that in school.

I was tempted to say “No thanks. I’m not buying another crap from AirAsia, not today”.

I kept quiet instead.


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