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?

Pilot Distracted By Former Flame

April 5, 2009 Attendant & Pilot Stories

Several years ago, I was flying on a smaller prop plane across TX. Not too many passengers on board, and the weather was choppy enough to be uncomfortable. During the flight, the pilot comes back and sits next to an attractive woman flying alone. “How has she been?,” he asks. Turns out they dated several […]

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Disabled Yet Denied Dog

April 4, 2009 Animal Stories

I was flying from El Paso to Burbank about a year and a half ago. I travel with a service dog. When I make my airline reservations, I am very clear that I travel with a service dog. My flight from El Paso to Phoenix was cancelled, and *** airlines put me on another flight. […]

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Gas Warfare

April 4, 2009 Odor Stories

For several years I was a very frequent flyer. The first year or two of my travel days, when I would get on the plane, I would have to walk by those snobby, rich, too good for me, first class people to reach my seat in the back of the plane. Being a person of […]

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Smuggled Pet Causes Panic

April 4, 2009 Animal Stories

I fly twice a week for business. I was on a flight from FLL to ATL that departed at 6am. Now I normally fly first class due to the fact of my status (I can’t afford first class nor would my company pay for it). The boarding process was normal and the aircraft, a Boeing […]

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Unbathed And Infested

April 4, 2009 Odor Stories

A couple of years ago, my husband and I got caught in traffic on the way to Dulles airport and missed our flight to Amsterdam. A wonderful UA employee fixed us up on a later flight through London and even kept us in our originally booked business class. Getting to London was fine. It was […]

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Stinky Hippy

April 4, 2009 Odor Stories

I was on a red eye from San Fran to Hartford. The plane was packed but I happened to have the only row that wasn’t full (or so I thought). As the gentleman 2 seats next to me and I looked at each other, happy that we wouldn’t be 3 across for a red eye, […]

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Airplane Restaurant

March 22, 2009 Non-Stories

How many times have you wished that you could board a plane without security hassles, or without the worries of missing your flight or the plane having to land on the Hudson River? And how many times have you desired a decent meal on a flight? In Taipei, Taiwan you can have all of the […]

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Extreme Flights From Hell

February 20, 2009 Non-Stories

While a flight from hell can certainly be traumatic, its impact usually lessens over time (especially after venting by writing about it and submitting the story to our website!). However, some flights unfortunately fall into the Extreme category, and the impact of the experience can be long lasting. What’s depicted in the first 5 minutes […]

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Treated Like Cattle

February 17, 2009 Delay/Cancellation Stories

Continental Flight 512 (EWR – POP Newark, NJ to Puerto Plata, Dominican Republic) 1/22/09 We arrived in Puerto Plata only to circle the airport for about an hour and a half. No updates were given by the crew. Finally the pilot said we were diverting to Santo Domingo airport because the cloud level was too […]

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No A/C, 110 Degrees, And A Full Plane

February 17, 2009 Delay/Cancellation Stories

Several years ago I was on a business trip from Ontario, CA to DFW. I arrived at the airport with time to spare and waited for my flight. We eventually boarded–a full flight. As we were getting buckled in, I heard the flight attendant talking to a gentleman seated across the aisle and behind me. […]

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Ugly Americans Taught A Lesson

January 25, 2009 Passenger Stories

Of all the pieces of travel advice that I’ve learnt over the years this is perhaps the most important one. Don’t lip off to security, most of them are just doing their job. This spring I found myself in the departure queue at the San Jose airport in Costa Rica waiting to board a flight […]

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Those Exciting Luggage Carousels

January 19, 2009 Non-Stories

The webpage, Airport Luggage Carousels – A Worldwide Report, is from the appropriately named website, Dull Men’s Club. For most people, the only thrill received from carousels is from the sense of relief that they get when their luggage is spotted. Not so for the site’s owner, Grover Click, who loves finding his bags because […]

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