Flights From Hell flies you into the crazy skies with stories about the adventures and anxieties of airplane travel.

Commercial airline travel takes us far, far out of our comfort zone. We're herded into cylinders that zip hundreds of miles per hour at 30,000 feet, subjected to security screenings, confronted with delays and lost luggage, rushed to catch connecting flights, constrained to small seats, scrunched up with strangers, and surrounded by pathogens. Is it any wonder we end up becoming a bundle of raw nerves by journey's end?

Plane Leaks Soak Passenger

September 30, 2010 Airplane Stories

Three years ago I was flying out of Newark Liberty Airport on an American Airlines flight. Being a Platinum frequent flier member, whenever a first class seat wasn’t available to me I would always go to the rear seats in the plane. I usually found that there was more room in that portion of the plane since most […]

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From the Mouths of Babes

September 29, 2010 Baby & Kid Stories

My family and I were in the back of a plane in a full cabin-width set of seats in one of those box car with wings puddle jumpers. We were in Charlottesville, VA in the middle of the summer, and the relative humidity was probably over 90%. The plane was pretty much loaded but the boarding […]

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Seat Scammer

September 28, 2010 Baby & Kid Stories

I was flying home on a red-eye United flight from Honolulu to San Francisco. My inter-island connecting flight from Kauai on Go! Airlines was late and I barely made it to the gate on time after a mad dash from one end of the airport to the other. The flight was fully booked and the […]

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Security Tries To Scan Film

September 27, 2010 Airport Stories

This isn’t a flight from hell, more like a screening from hell. Two friends and I went to China for a sightseeing vacation. This was 2004, so I didn’t bring my expensive digital camera, just my regular film camera. I put 7 rolls of film in a clear zip-lock baggie and in my pocket. At […]

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Disturbed Over Drops

September 26, 2010 Airplane Stories

I was recently traveling from Pierre, South Dakota to Portland, Oregon along with my wife and four kids after attending a funeral. The trip was going great – the kids were well-behaved (we even got several compliments on their behavior), everything was on time or early, and we even had time for a quick lunch […]

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Two Trips From Hell

September 25, 2010 Odds & Ends Stories

I don’t know if this counts as a “Flight From Hell” – it might be better placed on a website called “Vacations From Hell.” But since every one of the problems was caused by American Airlines, I think it is relevant. Please note that I am not making any of this up. I know it […]

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Computers Win Out Over Human Judgment

September 23, 2010 Airport Stories

I had a flight booked on Continental from Burlington, Vt to Las Vegas on July 27 for a conference starting July 28. My flight was scheduled to leave at 1:15 on July 27. At 11am I tried to print out a boarding pass online and could not. I checked the flight status and found the […]

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Flight Full Of Flatulence

September 22, 2010 Odor Stories

I was flying from Germany to Kenia with British Airways. The first annoyance was the arrangement of the seats: I had to sit straight up all the time because the seat rows were so tight that my knees bumped against the seat in front of mine, and I am a quite small woman. I don’t […]

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Passenger Dislikes Kids

September 21, 2010 Baby & Kid Stories

Wednesday night my son, my husband, and I returned to Boston on the red-eye from California. Due to their current booking policies, the airline we flew on would not book all three seats together. The new policy is such that if you want to sit with someone in particular you need to pay an extra […]

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Booted Off Plane For Body Odor

September 20, 2010 Odor Stories

The smell of death. A battlefield? A morgue? No. I smelled this awful aroma on a Southwest airplane. Sometime circa the summer of 2000, three friends and I were returning to San Jose from LAX. Everything started off normally. We arrived, checked in, and patiently waited an hour to board our flight. This is where […]

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Foul Weather Plagues Football Game And Flight

September 19, 2010 Weather Stories

This flight from hell took place in the fall of 2009. My wife and I had a 6am flight from Columbia, MO to Detroit, MI via Memphis, TN. First, I must say that my wife and I are both frequent fliers, and we are used to flying on all types of airplanes, including small turboprops. […]

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Stressed Out Over Seats

September 17, 2010 Seat Stories

A couple of weeks back I flew with American Airlines for the first time. And for the last time, too. I travelled together with my friend from Frankfurt to Philadelphia. Unfortunately, we were seated between two other passengers in the two middle seats in a row of four. When we took off I realized that […]

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