(CNN) It’s the stuff of nightmares. You’re trying to get somewhere, you’ve prepared and planned and you’re doing your best and yet you end up right where you started.
That’s pretty much what happened to frequent flier Bryan Gottlieb and his fellow Air New Zealand travelers on Thursday when their scheduled trip from Auckland to New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport was cut short by a power outage at the airport.
JFK’s Terminal 1 was closed and some of the flights landing there had to be diverted. Some international flights landed at other airports: Newark, Washington Dulles, Boston Logan.
Gottlieb’s flight ANZ2 turned around mid-flight and landed back in Auckland more than 16 hours after departing from the same airport. Flight tracking site FlightAware logs a total flight time of 16 hours and 25 minutes, with the plane turning around about halfway through its scheduled journey.
“I slept pretty well and woke up feeling like I was definitely going to end up in JFK soon,” Gottlieb said in a message to CNN Travel. Then “the passenger next to me tapped me on the shoulder and said, ‘Did you know we’re almost back in Auckland?'”
Gottlieb said his fellow passenger broke the news to him two or three hours before the plane landed. An announcement about the diversion didn’t come until the flight was almost back in New Zealand, he said, although “you could see our route on the tracker and word had gotten around.”
When the pilot made the announcement, he said: “He acknowledged that part of the decision was based on the efficiency of the airline’s schedule and that the lack of crew at an airport near JFK would have caused the airline further delays. “
The passengers were not happy.
“Anybody on that plane would have preferred to be at any airport in the US, let alone Newark or LaGuardia right in the same area,” said Gottlieb, a game designer who drove home from a five-week work trip to join the end of his brother’s bachelorette party journey.
Airline apologizes
Air New Zealand said in a statement to CNN Travel on Thursday that “a diversion to another US port would have meant the plane would be grounded for several days, impacting a number of other scheduled services and customers.”
At the time, the flight was still en route back to Auckland and the airline said its team was ready to help customers transfer to the next available service.
“We apologize for the inconvenience and thank our customers for their patience and understanding,” the statement said. CNN reached out to the airline on Friday for more details, but didn’t hear an immediate response.
Gottlieb, who lives in New York, spent eight hours at the Auckland airport waiting for his next flight to Los Angeles, where he was scheduled to land on JFK. Air New Zealand provided him with $100 worth of meal vouchers, but he had no luck refreshing at a loyalty club lounge in Auckland. At the time he communicated with CNN, he had not heard of any other compensation.
The diverted flight was Gottlieb’s second attempt to get home. Its original return flight to the States on Monday was canceled due to the devastating cyclone that hit New Zealand this week. His wife’s plans to accompany him for the final two weeks of his stay were thwarted when their flight was canceled due to flooding at Auckland airport at the end of January.
With the 16-hour Auckland to Auckland delay, he missed the bachelor party altogether. As for the trips, “it was definitely a wild one!”
Gottlieb said he was disappointed with the airline’s response “at a corporate level” but was met with very helpful airline staff.
“This is certainly the worst travel experience I’ve ever had, but ultimately these things happen and I always try to remember that none of the people I interact with had anything to do with the decisions that were delaying me – they they’re all just doing their best and they’ve been justifiably nice.”
And New Zealand is one of Gottlieb’s favorite places.
“The people and the region are both very beautiful. I wish it was closer though.”