Spirit leaves passengers stranded, seething

Flights are delayed or canceled after a blizzard knocks the small cut-rate airline for a loop.

By Times staff and wire reports

© St. Petersburg Times, published January 4, 2001

NEW YORK -- Stranded in New York since Saturday, 82-year-old Joan Moran had long since run out of patience with cut-rate carrier Spirit Airlines.

The St. Petersburg woman also ran out of her thyroid medication over the weekend and was starting to wonder whether she would ever catch a flight back to Tampa.

"I really don't feel good," said Moran, who was hoping to get on a flight late Wednesday. "I didn't expect to be here."

Scores of Spirit passengers finally caught planes out of town Wednesday, ending their long stay at New York's LaGuardia airport that began when Saturday's blizzard knocked the small airline for a loop.

About 9 p.m. Wednesday, several hundred Spirit passengers arrived at Tampa International Airport, all of them weary from waiting and angry with the airline.

They were met by Spirit passengers suffering delays in Tampa as they waited for a flight to Atlantic City, N.J.

"It was just such f---ing stupidity," said Heather Griffin of Tampa. Red-eyed and disheveled, Griffin finally arrived after a six-hour delay in LaGuardia during which Spirit employees offered passengers no information.

"I'm never calling them again. We sat on the plane for two hours because they didn't have a pilot or the paperwork they needed to fly."

Jim Hurley, who tried all day to get from Florida to Atlantic City, commiserated with Griffin.

"I've got a free round-trip ticket from them, and you can have it," Hurley said, "because I'm never flying with them again."

Hurley was supposed to fly out of Orlando at 9:30 a.m. Wednesday. When that flight was canceled, he and other passengers took a bus to Tampa, where they waited all day for a flight. At 9:30 p.m., he still hadn't left Tampa.

Hurley spent the day talking to other stranded Spirit passengers.

"Everybody you talk to is teed off and fired up," he said.

Earlier in the day, dozens of passengers were bumped off Spirit flights and left looking for any way to get out of New York. A restless crowd of several dozen Spirit passengers lounged around a TWA gate Wednesday waiting for their flight to Florida after a message board flashed a report that a Spirit flight would leave from there.

No one from Spirit was in sight.

"There's no one giving information," complained Kelly O'Donnell, 21, a University of South Florida student. "They haven't said a word to us."

O'Donnell flew to New York last week on a $170 round-trip ticket. She traveled with her sister, Maureen, and their friend, Melissa Barbato. They were supposed to return Saturday, but their flight was canceled.

The three made the best of their change in plans. They checked out the Christmas tree at Rockefeller Center and stayed with relatives on Long Island.

"If we can stay on our vacation a little longer, we can deal," said Maureen O'Donnell, 19, who also attends the University of South Florida.

The women packed plenty of clothes, but were starting to run out of socks by yesterday. But after a nice break, they were eager to dump Spirit for good.

"The price is good," Maureen O'Donnell said. "But I don't think I'd want that much of a hassle again."

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