Breaking news – Hell freezes over, Eliott goes to China
Winter had a firm choke-hold on air travel but I was determined to be on my way. My connection to Detroit was one of the scariest landing I'd ever experienced, the plane came in tilted at an angle and didn't land on all wheels at once - I could feel the wheels skidding on the ice. Shaken but resolute, I headed to my connecting gate and got my first experience of a major cultural difference - Chinese don't hold much to the idea of personal space, and will swarm any line.
The first of many lines of Chinese on my trip
I fought my way onto the plane and found my seat. Everyone got settled, we pulled out from the terminal, and found that the queue for deicing was long. Two hours long. After deicing, we are queued for takeoff, and our plane lost power. Finally we regained power, but then there was a faulty status light. The problem persisted and a maintenance crew was called.
A third hour ticked by. The problem was resolved, the lights were green, we were back in queue to take off. Then we hit the fourth hour, and federal regulations state that they can’t legally make people sit on a plane for longer than four hours without giving them a chance to disembark the nightmare. This option was given, with the information that with our position in queue, we would be taking off within twenty minutes. There were four people that vote to escape, so our plane taxied back to the terminal, much to everyone's chagrin. The four weak stomached passengers wanted their luggage of course, but one passengers is unable to be found.
Even the automatic flight tracker has no idea what's going on
A fifth hour ticked by. The last bag was located and everyone praised their deity of choice. We pulled out from the terminal and resumed our position in the queue. There was ice forming on the windows and I feared we would have to deice...again. Apparently I wasn't the only passenger with this fear, and others were more vocal. The captain announced over the intercom that there was no need to worry, the wings are the only portion of the plane that are required to stay ice free, and the thick coating of environmentally harmful gel will last well past our eventual take off time.
The sixth hour comes and goes. Back in the queue, we finally got our chance to take off. Six and a half hours after sitting down in my seat, we finally eased into the sky, and I’m on the way to Beijing.
