The effects of fog on a passengers brain

The following is from a particular foggy day in July. Fog on the Isle of Man is quite common, and yet it does something to the brain of certain people, which turns them into utter morons.

Location: The Isle of Man

Scenario: The airport is completely fogged out, visibility is so bad we can't even see the control tower from the office. The TAF shows that the fog is due to be in all day and all evening. All flights of our own and other airlines are delayed, and we offer the passengers a choice of rebooking to another day, or waiting until the fog clears.

Passengers are anxious and a bit bored whilst they wait, and EasyJet have just cancelled their service, and are telling their people to come back tomorrow. We're a bit more optimistic about the weather as we're a local airline, and just have everything delayed.

We've had three aircraft divert to the nearest airfield across the sea, and currently we have passengers waiting over there for an improvement in the weather.

It's a bit of a naff day to say the least, but we're keeping everyone informed. But it's fog, and no one can do anything about it.

The vast majority of passengers accept it, and sort themselves out, and generally just get on with it. We're all adults here, it's not like fog is an uncommon thing and we'll treat you like adults and paying customers. These are all fine, we can deal with this fine - we aren't Ryanair, we aren't going to cancel your flight and leave you stranded. However, then we get 'those' passengers. These people are the problem.

Some choice comments are:

• "Why are we not going? EasyJet on their big nice jet would have made it in. You're a terrible airline, I'm never flying with you again" said the passenger at Blackpool. Even after telling her that in fact EasyJet had already cancelled an hour ago stranding over 100 passengers, and that she could either wait or travel tomorrow, she persisted in her rant.

• "I've got an important meeting, I MUST get off the Island RIGHT NOW. I want you to tell the pilot he has to take off NOW." said the man on the island. The departure lounge has windows all around it, where upon you can only see the white blanket of Manannans cloak. There are no aircraft at any of the stands as they are all elsewhere. 

• "My aunty/uncle/great granddad up in Ramsey says there's no fog there and it's really sunny" Well, no shit, really? 

Needless to say, comments like this aren't helpful. If you are one of these people, please think before you speak.

Anyway, the fun ended in the mid afternoon when looking out of the hangar we could start to see an improvement. We asked the 3 crews in Blackpool to get ready to depart, and as soon as the weather cleared we were airborne. 20 minutes later we had landed with 3 full planes full of grateful passengers. The rest of the flights proceeded as normal, abeit a bit more full after the mornings delays.

The rest of the afternoon proceeded as normal. However we still received about ten complaints and requests for compensation for their delays. We can deal with complaints when they come in as long as they are something we can fix. We cannot give you a satisfactory answer if you say "You should be able to land in fog" or my personal favourite:

"My flight with EasyJet was cancelled and so I was stranded so I had to rebook with you and it cost me £120. Why are you so much more expensive than EasyJet?" 

And that was a random Tuesday in July. 

Chil