JetBlue Airways: How I Was Molested On My Summer Vacation
Written: Jul 17 '02 (Updated Jul 17 '02)
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Product Rating:
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Pros: satellite television, Cheddar Dolphins
Cons: narrow seats & aisles, lack of gate agents, molestation
The Bottom Line: While the DirectTV screens on the seatbacks are nice, there isn't anything else other than low fares to make me want to fly them again.
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| jdhauer's Full Review: JetBlue Airways |
While I was very impressed with a recent flight from Washington Dulles to Fort Lauderdale, I wasn't as impressed with my return flight. Part of the difference may have been that JetBlue was inaugurating their service from Dulles to Long Beach the day I departed out of Dulles and all of their big wigs were on site. Of course you are on your best behavior when you know you are being watched.
Reservations
This trip was a birthday present from my parents. A couple of months earlier, my husband and I had taken Amtrak's AutoTrain south to visit them for a week. Unfortunately, Amtrak managed to do over $1,600 of damage to our car and we ended up losing four days out of our 9 day vacation taking care of the car. My parents really wanted to spend more time with my daughter so they purchased our tickets over JetBlue's website five weeks before we planned to travel.
Purchasing over the Internet gave them a $5 discount on each ticket. I was concerned a little because sometimes when tickets are purchased over the Internet, when you check in you are required to present the credit card with which the tickets were purchased. This was never an issue.
We were able to reserve seats at the time of making the reservation and were easily able to reserve a middle and a window seat for each trip. No aisle seats were available on the website when the reservation was made. This was not a problem for us since I was traveling with a baby in a car seat and she is required to be in a window seat.
The cost for our two tickets was $398 round trip. Over $50 of that was taxes and fees. Some airlines offer discounted seats when you purchase a seat for a child under age 2. JetBlue does not offer such discounts.
Check-in and Security
Unfortunately, I had to bring and check a lot more luggage than I feel comfortable carrying. I had the baby's stroller, diaper bag and carseat, a small bag with my clothes for two weeks and two other large bags containing clothes, blankets, crib sheets, and other baby stuff. I did not carry a purse.
Checking all of the bags except the stroller, diaper bag and car seat was a breeze at both Dulles and Fort Lauderdale. Curb side luggage check was available at both airports and used by me! I despise traveling with more than I can carry but I had no choice this time. With the new security regulations, I don't know what I would have done if curb check in wasn't an option since you aren't allowed to leave any bags unattended and I couldn't carry everything at once.
Security at both airports was a ridiculous torture exercise as usual and wouldn't catch any terrorists. I obviously look like someone who would want to hijack a plane since I was pulled for security checks.
The baby had to come out of her stroller and the stroller, diaper bag and car seat had to go through the x-ray scanner. We walked through the little scanning gate. No bells or whistles went off but I was told I was being randomly checked and I was requested to do the well-known spread eagle position. I asked if I could at least put the baby in her stroller and I was told to put her on the floor. I refused. I didn't care if I missed my flight but I was not putting my daughter on that filthy floor with no one to watch her. A supervisor was called over and permission was granted grudgingly for me to put the baby in her stroller so she wouldn't crawl away and get into trouble. After taking off my shoes and getting my bra felt up and unbuttoning my jeans, we were allowed to go. This happened at both airports.
Strollers can be gate checked and this was a godsend for me as it's hard to carry a 20 lb. baby, a car seat and a loaded diaper bag when you are by yourself.
At Dulles, the big wigs were in town to celebrate so when I asked about checking the stroller when I got to the gate, I was offered breakfast since they had bagels and danish left over from their early morning party. I was also told to leave the car seat with them and they would put it on the plane for me. I was amazed because no one had ever offered to help before when I've traveled unless I've asked first.
Returning from Fort Lauderdale, I arrived at the airport 2 hours early and asked about leaving the car seat with the gate agent which was okayed but I was asked to wait until they sent off the flight before ours. As soon as that flight departed, so did all of the gate agents and no one reappeared until 15 minutes before our flight was scheduled to leave. I carted that car seat into the bathroom to change a diaper and gave up on trying to get anything to eat since I couldn't maneuver with everything into the gift shop or the snack bar area. That's what I get for buying a Britax car seat. They are terribly safe but terribly big too. Leaving it unattended was not an option with the new security measures.
The Fort Lauderdale flight was delayed by more than an hour because of mechanical problems. The gate agents (who had reappeared) decided to have a singing contest to "entertain" the customers waiting to board the flight. Unfortunately, the contestants were all 6th grade students traveling to Washington DC for a field trip. We listened to the theme songs for "Elmo's World" and "Barney". I wanted to crawl under a seat and die. The gate agents seemed to think this was cute. So did the students. No one else appreciated it.
Flight Experience: Or How I Was Molested On My Summer Vacation
I flew on two Airbus A-320 planes. While JetBlue boasts leather seating, they fail to mention that you're sitting 6 across with a tiny aisle down the center. The seats are narrow and the pitch between them had my knees in the seat in front of me. I'm only 5'4 and most of my height is not in my legs. I can't imagine how uncomfortable my 6'5 husband would be.
When we departed Dulles, all of the gate agents and ground crew were lined up on the tarmac, waving the plane goodbye. Maybe that's where all of the agents were in Fort Lauderdale but I didn't see anyone waving that plane goodbye.
JetBlue also advertises that you have the opportunity to watch DirecTV on your personal video screen located on the seat back in front of you. They don't mention that you only get 20 channels and most of those are sports and news. There was the Cartoon Network but Scooby-Doo is still too advanced for my daughter. I watched the progress of the flight a little while and the Travel channel for a bit.
Drink service with the usual selection of soft drinks, coffee and water is offered. You can purchase beer or some mixed drinks. A flight attendant then walks the aisle offering passengers their choice of a snack from a basket. Choices included Terra Blue potato chips, Cheddar Dolphins, biscotti, chocolate chip cookies, bagel chips and animal crackers. The Terra Blues are really more of a dark brown/purple color and they have a nutty, sweet taste to them. The cheese dolphins have more of a cheese taste to them than Pepperidge Farm Goldfish. Flight attendants aren't stingy with the snacks. The woman sitting next to us on our return flight had five or six snacks.
Speaking of the woman sitting next to us... On our return flight from Fort Lauderdale, the woman sitting next to us was suffering from a somewhat advanced but not incapacitating case of dementia. She was in the aisle seat, I was in the middle and my daughter was at the window. This lady kept running her hands up and down my legs and arm. I asked her to stop and her caretaker across the aisle said "She's senile and doesn't know what she's doing." I asked him if there was anything he could do. He said he couldn't and he wasn't going to change seats since he was next to two 6th graders and children shouldn't have to be molested. I rang for a flight attendant who told me there was nothing that could be done since the plane was full. She said I could stand in the aisle throughout the flight. I looked at her incredulously! I'm supposed to leave my child strapped in next to someone that her own caretaker called "a molester"? I huddled as close to my daughter as I could but had hands running all over me throughout the flight. There were no apologies from the caretaker nor from anyone with JetBlue.
Luggage Service
None of my luggage was lost although one piece was damaged and another had proof that it had not been handled gently. The damaged luggage had a metal attachment for a strap which had been sheared in half. The strap itself had been safely stowed inside the case before I checked it. The other suitcase had a small can of powdered formula which was taped shut and then stored inside a plastic Ziploc bag. At the time, my daughter was weaning off of formula and it was her last can. I didn't want to purchase another can since she would probably only be on it for a few more days at most. When I retrieved that piece of luggage (a wheeled case from Lands End), there was white powder billowing out from the case. I opened it and the can of formula had been smashed open.
Jet Blue Airways
800-538-2583
800-JET-BLUE
Recommended:
No
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Epinions.com ID:
jdhauer
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Location: Virginia
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