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?

Mrs. Hocker

April 9, 2010 Passenger Stories

In one of my trans-Atlantic voyages to Europe, I had the joy of sitting next to an expert in languages. I don’t remember the layout of the plane, but I normally take a window seat so I can sleep against the window so I am not completely zonked when I land in Amsterdam. I get […]

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Norwalk Virus Hell

April 8, 2010 Illness/Medical Stories

The worst flight of my life turned into the all around worst experience of my life because it didn’t end when the plane did. The background info: I was returning from a friend’s wedding in the Dominican Republic, and like everyone else on the direct flight back to Regina, I had contracted the Norwalk virus that was […]

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Passengers Boarded For Good On-Time Rating

April 8, 2010 Delay/Cancellation Stories

I was traveling from San Diego to Montreal in summer 2006 when I experienced this nonsense. I was traveling with a couple of colleges for a conference. We arrived a bit late at the gate. I was hungry and needed some coffee, but before I could find a café, the flight attendant announced boarding and […]

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Dealing With A Claustrophobic

April 7, 2010 Portly Stories

My husband and I were returning from Mexico after a lovely two week vacation. He had the window seat and I had the middle seat. A very large lady seated behind my husband kept standing up and hunching herself under the overhead bins. I noticed she was sweating a lot and breathing quite heavily. That’s […]

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Separation Anxiety

April 6, 2010 Baby & Kid Stories

I was traveling with my two year old from Denver to Toronto. When we got to ticketing they put us in seats eleven rows apart, and said sorry we can’t do anything, you will have to talk to the stewardess. As we boarded I took up the same conversation with the stewardess, who told me […]

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Delayed, Over-Booked & Misinformed

April 6, 2010 Delay/Cancellation Stories

I want to preface this by saying that I usually fly three or four times a year and have never been on this airline before. I took a business trip from Tucson to Santa Barbara recently on US Airways. Arrived at the airport in plenty of time prior to the 8:15 AM departure. It was […]

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Some Saints And Gravol Save The Day

April 5, 2010 Baby & Kid Stories

I was travelling with my two kids, 3 and 7 back from South Carolina for March Break (where we visited my folks). I had booked through Travelocity. Bad idea. Won’t ever 1) book through them 2) travel through Chicago EVER AGAIN. They booked us on a connection we did not stand a snowball’s chance of […]

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Passenger Blames Hippie Girl For Stinkiness

April 4, 2010 Odor Stories

I went sailing one year in Key West during Race Week. I helped the owner deliver the boat back to Ft. Lauderdale when we were done. The sail from Key West back to the mainland was awful. The sea was so rough that we had to just piss ourselves as we sat on the edge […]

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Stinky Like A Bad Public Toilet In France

April 4, 2010 Odor Stories

I was travelling from Atlanta to Newark, then on to Toronto with my then 2 year old. He has always been an excellent traveller by any standards. Plays nicely by himself, looks out the window, no screaming, etc. even back then. But you always get them, lots of dirty looks though from the business class. […]

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Tests Of Endurance

April 3, 2010 Odds & Ends Stories

I was on a flight from Athens to Montreal, on Olympic Airways in 2004 on an Airbus 340. That’s my first really long flight. It was a night flight, so after a while people tried to sleep. There was some middle aged guy in front of me who actually stood up from his seat and […]

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Polite Policy For Portly People

April 2, 2010 Portly Stories

My husband and I flew from Calgary to London England last fall on British Airways. We checked with the airline a day ahead of time before making our seat selection to find out how full the flight would be. We were told it had lots of empty seats. We decided to each choose window seats […]

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Rocking And Rolling In Rough Weather

April 2, 2010 Weather Stories

I had 2 flights from hell oddly enough only a few weeks apart in NOV-DEC 2002. On the November flight, I was a passenger on a Southwest flight from Columbus, Ohio to Chicago-Midway airport. I had flown this route many times before and it is usually only about a 50 minute trip. On this particular […]

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