Anywhere But Here

A freshman’s first solo flight, a 48 hour journey back to NYC after spring break

By Willow Bradford

Illustration by Jiaying Geng

As what feels like the only Type A person in my family, embarking on my first solo trip was a stroke of luck after years of waking up at 4 a.m. for flights from Newark Airport and bickering through hooded eyes and coffee-less hands. My spring break trip from New York to Montreal should have been relaxing and stress-free. Arriving at the airport three hours early should have meant calmly making my way through security and border control, airport Spotify playlist blocking out the noise of other vacationing families. And from LaGuardia to Montreal-Trudeau airport this was true, however, from Montreal-Trudeau back to LaGuardia 48 extra hours emerged.

Admittedly, an additional 48 hours in a foreign country might be considered another stroke of luck—leave work behind to visit the museum you didn’t have time to explore or the speakeasy beneath the Japanese restaurant—but for me it was stress, with a side of waiting.

March 21

10:31 a.m.: United Airlines emails me that I will be flying Air Canada Jazz tomorrow at 8 p.m. and I should check in for my flight. Supposedly, after check-in they will release a boarding pass for me. 

March 22

5:00 p.m.: “Supposedly they will release my boarding pass,” I joke with my Uber driver as he pulls into the international section of the drop-off zone at Montreal-Trudeau airport. It’s three hours before my flight and Air Canada has yet to put me on the plane, and so I resolve myself to speak what little French I know to the help desk inside. As I walk into the airport I am greeted by kiosk after kiosk lined in a row—beckoning me to try and find my boarding pass. 

5:13 p.m.: The white kiosk spits out my red boarding pass, innocuous at first. But upon closer inspection no seat assignment appears, instead “standby” is printed in small black letters. However, undiscouraged and oblivious to the implications of “standby,” I breeze through security and border control.

5:58 p.m.: As I exit border control, the neon sign above me reads Gate 86 for Air Canada flight AC 8646. It is two hours before my flight is scheduled to depart. “A good omen—to be through security that fast,” I mutter to myself as I head toward Gate 86, “it must be because my flight is on time.”

6:02 p.m.: My plane is delayed from 8:20 p.m. to 9:53 p.m.

6:20 p.m.: A blonde woman in Air Canada attire fixes herself at the check-in desk at Gate 86 and intones over the loudspeaker if a “Willow Bradford” would please come to see her. Juggling a caffeinated drink, caprese sandwich, carry-on suitcase, passport, and “standby” boarding pass, I intend to sort out my situation. She informs me that I have no seat on Jazz 8646 and that in order to fly tonight, I will need to convince at least two people to give up their seats. If I am unable to convince them, then I will be put on the next flight tomorrow morning. Fine, these are conditions I can work with. I set off across the waiting area looking for prey to poach. 

6:27 p.m.: My plane is delayed from 9:53 p.m. to 10:13 p.m. 

6:28 p.m.: My first victim falls—she is already late for a business meeting in New York due to the delay, no use in rushing back now. She walks up to the blonde Air Canada woman and claims her free March 23 flight.

7:43 p.m.: My plane is delayed from 10:13 p.m. to 10:53 p.m.

10:03 p.m.: My second victim has fallen of their own accord, yet it doesn’t matter because now my place is guaranteed on this flight. It doesn’t matter that I still have no assigned seat because the blonde Air Canada woman has promised one to me.

10:03 p.m.: My plane is delayed from 10:53 p.m. to 11:38 p.m. 

10:05 p.m.: Gate 86 has now changed to Gate 79. There is an exodus of Jazz 8646 passengers that flood up the escalator to the new gate. I am carried with them, a mere buoy on the sea. The rest of Montreal-Trudeau airport is empty.

10:18 p.m.: Jazz 8646 has made it from LaGuardia, slightly lower on fuel but not much worse for the wear and boarding begins early. 

The only issue is that row 27 of the plane is unable to seat passengers; whatever the mysterious cause of closure, four more passengers are booted off the plane. Luckily for them, two seats have recently opened up elsewhere and I watch as a former row 27-er snatches my spot; I am regulated back to the “standby” lane. (My amazing blonde Air Canada lady’s shift has ended and she never told anyone about our promise). The plane becomes full, and I am seatless once again. 

10:24 p.m.: By now the queue for boarding has dwindled and I stand facing the blonde woman’s replacement, fear and anger blazing behind my eyes. That seat was mine. I plead with the Air Canada man to see if there is any way I can sit in row 27—how broken could it be? I’m just a first-year with class tomorrow! Or perhaps they could upgrade me to first class? Yet my supplications fall on deaf ears as he shakes his head sadly. From the window, I watch Jazz 8646 pulling away from the gangway. It feels like a wrench in my gut. An eternity seems to pass before the Air Canada attendant speaks.

“The best we can do for you is get you a flight tomorrow. If you’d like, we can put you in business class on a 10:25 a.m. flight to LaGuardia. Air Canada extends its deepest apologies for the stress it has caused and will give you Air Canada points and free transportation to and from the airport tonight and tomorrow.” 

10:25 p.m.: The new confirmation email hits my inbox, no boarding pass attached.

March 23

7:12 a.m.: Back in my friend’s McGill dorm, one free transportation pass, and a restless night’s sleep later, I wake up to three missed calls from my dad. I dial him back, and he answers in seconds—“Your flight last night wasn’t Jazz 8646 was it?”

Jazz 8646, the flight I was originally on until row 27 closed, had crashed at LaGuardia Airport into a firetruck that had been crossing the runway. Both pilots were killed and dozens of passengers were hospitalized. I can recall their faces as I stood, the night before, in standby waiting—hoping—to be on that flight. Bleary eyes and creaking joints, stiffened by hours sitting in the same position, I remember a blonde woman carrying a neck pillow next to her partner, another young girl traveling by herself with a small white suitcase.

It’s a strange thing, survivor’s guilt. And although no passengers were fatally injured, I still asked myself why I had survived. What makes me so special that the universe put so many roadblocks in my way to prevent me from getting on that plane? Am I indebted to believe some higher power exists because it saved me? Who gets to be saved? I don’t have answers to these questions. I have no solutions on how to deal with something that never actually happened to me. I have no guidance for what to do next, except an email stating my flight was cancelled again and it is rescheduled for Tuesday because LaGuardia is operating at lower capacity.

March 24

9:00 a.m.: My suitcase packed and brimming with potential regret that I hadn’t taken the alternative 10 hour bus from Montreal to New York, I make for Montreal-Trudeau airport once again with three things tucked into the pages of my passport: my $1000 Air Canada voucher, my last free transportation ticket, and my old boarding pass for a March 23 flight that never happened.

It will happen that you will get to the airport. IT will override the system to print your boarding pass due to the ongoing investigation into the crash because your name was in the flight manifest of Jazz 8646. You will land at LaGuardia, sitting in luxurious business class and see the remnants of your plane on the side of the runway. You will board the M-60 for Barnard and it will break down in the middle of the highway. You will have to transfer, shuffled like cards, from one bus to the next before finally making it back.

2:34 p.m.: This will all happen but for now you are grateful to be safe. I smile to myself as the plane touches down, not because I have made it back to the U.S. but because of who I met in Montreal. People, new and old, unfazed, and unafraid to lend a hand in the face of uncertainty.