Some Web-savvy fliers dig themselves out

ATLANTA — Some travelers stranded by the great East Coast snowstorm of 2010 discovered a new lifeline for help. When all else fails, Twitter might be the best way to book a seat home.

While airline reservation lines required hours of waiting — if people could get through at all — savvy wired travelers were able to book new reservations, obtain flight information and track lost luggage. And they could complain, too.

Anger mounted Wednesday over passengers stranded on airport tarmacs and in terminals as flight delays threatened to stretch into the weekend after the worst December snowstorm to hit New York in six decades.

As many as 1.2 million airline customers may have been affected by flight cancellations as the storm that hit three days ago closed major airports. Passengers were forced to try to make new plans, sometimes without being able to reach airlines by phone or online for help.

Since Monday, however, nine Delta Air Lines agents with special Twitter training have been rotating shifts to help travelers wired enough to know how to "dm," or send a direct message. Many other airlines are doing the same as a way to help travelers cut through the confusion of a storm that has grounded almost 9,400 flights.

But not all travelers, of course. Anybody who could not send a Twitter message if their life depended on it found themselves with that familiar feeling that often comes with air travel — being left out of yet another inside track to get the best information.

But for those in the digital fast lane, the online help was a godsend.

Danielle Heming spent five hours Wednesday waiting for a flight from Fort Myers, Fla., home to New York. Finally, it was canceled.

Facing overwhelmed JetBlue ticketing agents, busy signals on the phone and the possibility that she might not find a seat until New Year's Day, she remembered that a friend had rebooked her flight almost immediately by sending a Twitter message to the airline.

She pulled out her iPhone, did a few searches and sent a few messages. Within an hour, she had a seat on another airline and a refund from JetBlue.

"It was a much, much better way to deal with this situation," said Heming, 30, a student at New York University. "It was just the perfect example of this crazy, fast-forward techno world."

Only a few tweeters

Although airlines reported a doubling or tripling of Twitter traffic during the latest storm, the number of travelers who use Twitter is still small. Only about 8 percent of people who go online use Twitter, said Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Internet & American Life Project, a nonprofit that studies the social impact of the Internet.

"This is still the domain of elite activist customers," Rainie said.

Of course, an agent with a Twitter account cannot magically make a seat appear. More often than not, the agent's role is to listen to people complain.

"@DeltaAssist is worthless," wrote Amy Zopfi, an event services manager in Las Vegas who was stuck for hours in Salt Lake City and sent a stream of complaints to the Delta Twitter account.

Travelers were incensed over what they say is the airlines' effort to blame everything on the weather and take themselves off the hook.

"We don't blame the airlines or airports for bad weather, but it's their responsibility to be prepared," said Brandon Macsata of the Association for Airline Passenger Rights. "The airlines just seem to be saying, 'Suck it up.' People are tired of sucking it up."

Passengers on a Cathay Pacific Airways flight were stuck on the tarmac at Kennedy for nearly 12 hours Tuesday as they waited for a gate. Four other services operated by the carrier also were stranded for more than four hours, Cathay said in a statement Wednesday, apologizing for delays. More than 1,100 people were aboard the five flights, it said. A British Airways plane with 316 people onboard waited for nearly eight hours.

"These people should put in a bit more effort," Kathy Kia, 31, said of the airlines. She was stuck at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport on Monday when her flight to LaGuardia was canceled. She was told she couldn't be guaranteed a seat until Dec. 31, and was placed on standby for an American Airlines flight Tuesday.

90 minutes on hold

Other passengers complained about spending 90 minutes on hold before reaching reservations agents, or not being able to get an answer at all. American and US Airways added agents to field calls or put workers on mandatory overtime.

Travelers calling to rebook flights in huge numbers were put on hold for hours or told to call back later because the major airlines have fewer reservations agents to take their calls.

For example, Continental cut 600 call-center jobs — nearly one-fourth of its 2,600 reservations workers — in February. A few months earlier, the airline closed a center in Florida and cut 500 jobs. American cut about 500 when it closed a center in Connecticut.

United Airlines has 10,000 customer-service and reservations employees, down from about 15,000 in the early 2000s, according to Rich Delaney, president of the machinists' union, which represents the workers. United once had 17 reservations offices; it now has three, he said.

The airlines cut staff because so many people now book tickets online. Airlines often encouraged the trend by charging customers a fee to book over the phone.

US Air imposed mandatory overtime for customer-service workers to handle calls during the storm. American said it asked people to cut short vacations and extended the hours of part-time workers at call centers and airports.

Sometimes, just connecting with someone at an airline can calm angry passengers.

"What you constantly hear from airline passengers is, 'Just tell me what's going on. I can adjust my travel expectations and my personal life if I just know what's going on,' " Rainie said.

He also said stranded families were using their gadgets in a team approach to getting answers.

"Mom would be on Twitter, Dad on Facebook, Junior would be searching sites and whoever hit pay dirt first is the way the family would figure out what to do next," he said.

Even when help is not forthcoming, airlines' Twitter accounts serve as a news source. People could share information — and pain.

Jammin' to JetBlue

One woman sent messages noting every 1980s song that JetBlue played while she was on hold and stranded in the airport in Burbank, Calif. (Terence Trent D'Arby anyone?)

Brian Devinney, who used to work in the travel industry, is stuck in Jacksonville, Fla., until his flight leaves for New York on Jan. 2. So he spent three hours Tuesday night offering information to stranded travelers who were using the airline Twitter accounts.

"With Twitter, you have people who were reaching out looking for something, for a community of people stuck in the same situation," Devinney said.

The New York Port Authority faulted some airlines after at least six international flights were stuck on the tarmac at Kennedy airport with passengers aboard because they had no gates to use.

The Transportation Department is looking into details of the New York flight delays, Olivia Alair, an agency spokeswoman, said in an e-mail.

Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood was being updated on the crisis.

LaHood, who helped push through a regulation allowing domestic carriers to be fined for tarmac delays of more than three hours, made no public comments. International airlines aren't covered by the rule.

"It is an airline's responsibility to make sure before they leave their point of origin to make sure that they have a gate assignment," said Steve Coleman, a Port Authority spokesman. "These airlines did not. So they got to the airport and had no place to dock."

Information from The Associated Press and Bloomberg News is included in this report.