Can anyone update us on the status of AE today please? Were there any BT's on the flight that was sent back to BON?

Ann, can you provide details? I'm assuming a flight that left Bon for SJ returned to Bon for some reason?

AE returned to BON after flying around to burn off fuel. The road in front of the airport was closed. This was reported to me from my friend who heard it on the Papiamentu radio today.

Well,AA website says estimated departure 1:30 PM if that means anything. Mick

AA phone info says 5055 arrived SJU 3:30pm today.

David

(Message edited by Bostondavid on March 13, 2006)

Hi, all. My husband and I were on the AE flight that had to return to Bonaire on Monday, March 13. We took off as scheduled at 0700, then proceeded to enjoy what we thought was our final view of Bonaire from the air. We circled the entire island several times, before the pilot came on to tell us that the landing gear would not go up. We then had a lovely almost two hour flight round and round Bonaire to burn off enough fuel for an emergency landing, as the flight crew did not know if the wheels where locked in place or not. We went over emergency landing procedures, opening the emergency exits, learned the "brace postion",etc. We then had to fly low, almost as if we were landing in order for the ground crew to visually inspect the landing gear. We then proceeded to loop back around and land safely, surrounded by fire trucks and emergency vehicles. The pilots and entire flight crew were absolutely outstanding and kept us well informed throughout. We were then welcomed back to Bonaire (yippee!) and spent until around 1330 with a totally open bar and whatever we wanted from the airport restaurant all charged to AE. The AE staff helped us all to arrange new itineraries and book hotels, if necessary, all covered by AE. Beat the hell out of our scheduled 6 1/2 hour layover in San Juan! The AE staff in Bonaire and the AA staff in Puerto Rico provided the best customer service I have seen for a long time. One woman in San Juan in particular went above and beyond to help us work out some final kinks in our connection in Philly, which we ultimately missed, but that was US Air, so not surprising. I wish AA would start flying jets to Bonaire with better time schedules, as I'm sure we all do! Am considering moving to Amsterdam, so we can fly non stop on a big jet and arrive and leave at civilized hours!

June, great post thanks for the boost, We are flying AE to Bonaire from San Juan in a few weeks and all the bad press I've been reading was getting me a little worried. Glad to hear everyone was safe and kept happy!

Thanks for the firsthand account June. I hope you sent an Attagirl to AA for that helpful San Juan Agent.

Seb, Yes, I do plan on writing a note to thank AA for the great service. On another note, I don't think we will ever fly through Philly or on US Air again...polar opposite of AA experience. We arrived to find that they cancelled all flights after 10 PM, according to them "due to rain and fog", but the word around the departure gates was that the flights were not full enough, so were all consolidated to the next day. Slept at the airport with muzak, bright lights and "don't leave your bags unattended" announcements every 15 minutes! Fortunately we are "glass half full" people and just laughed, ate sushi, drank beer and made the most of it. There are alot of people who can't even take a vacation, so why ••••• about a few delays and hassles. After all we got to spend 10 days in Bonaire! And the emergency landing issue certainly could have turned out differently, so we were lucky on that count too.

June, I like your glass half full attitude Glad you made it home safely, and had a good time on Bon

Once again, AA shines in customer service! I wrote an email to Customer Service to let them know what a great job their employees did. I received a personal reply letter apologizing for the inconvenience and adding a good number of FF miles to my account. I'll fly with AA again anytime....

Thanks for sharing the good news.
Your account of the landing is chilling. I'm glad it was followed with such positivity ~ you're my kinda folk!