An Update

Hi All, this is Chris writing from Germany. It's been a tough go since I left Connecticut with delay after delay. It's easy to be a little annoyed and slightly upset with the situation but that doesn't do a lot of good.

I left Connecticut on Wednesday afternoon and as I write this on Saturday evening, I am still roughly halfway. We landed at Ramstein, Germany on Friday morning where we let some passengers off. We reboarded and took off, heading for Aviano, Italy. Shortly before landing, I heard the landing gear of the aircraft lower and then shortly afterwards the pilot gunned the engines and pulled the gear back up. "Missed approach," I thought. Which is weird because they're not all that common among airline pilots. We circled around the airport for a while and then did it all over. Gear down, waiting, waiting...full power, gear up. "Another missed approach!"

At that time they came on the intercom and said that there was a problem with the ILS (Instrument Landing System) at Aviano and we were headed back to Ramstein, about 45 minutes away. We landed and got off the aircraft where they had us wait for buses to transport us to a hotel an hour and a half away. Long story short, they were not able to get into Aviano today either but are looking at options. Perhaps Verona, Italy or someplace else. Apparently their transit passes are only good at certain airports at certain times so there are not a lot of options. Additionally, there are some security issues.

So tonight I am staying in Darmstadt, Germany. A cool little town that I spent some time in 2007. I am actually staying in the same hotel I stayed in in 2007 as well but am too tired to go out. Try again tomorrow... Hope all is well with the rest of you.

Chris

By the way, I have taken some pictures but while I have my camera, the cables to connect it to the computer are in my checked bags, sitting in the belly of an airplane 60 miles away. Yes, I have clean clothes :-)