ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1996, Roanoke Times
DATE: Friday, January 5, 1996 TAG: 9601050039
SECTION: VIRGINIA PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: BLACKSBURG
SOURCE: By ELISSA MILENKY STAFF WRITER
ABOUT 500 CUSTOMERS of Omni Travel & Tours arrived in Roanoke Wednesday, two days later than planned. Their return from the Sugar Bowl in New Orleans was delayed first by weather, then by a lack of available charter planes.
The explaining has begun, now that the last of the stranded Hokie fans has made it home from New Orleans. And there are plenty of people doing the explaining.
Local travel agents, middleman travel companies in faraway locations and charter airline executives all described the time between Monday and Wednesday evening, when the last Tech fans straggled into Roanoke Regional Airport, with one word: "nightmare." A combination of bad weather, miscommunication and flights packed with people from a later bowl game were blamed.
"I've been under all kinds of stress before in my life, but I have never, ever been under the kind of stress I was in those 48 hours," said Larry Cowley, a Blacksburg doctor and co-owner of Blacksburg's Omni Travel & Tours, one of two local travel agencies that did not get all its customers home until Wednesday. He and his wife and co-owner, Patti, are considering taking legal action against the charter airline and public tour and charter company that booked the flights.
The approximately 500 Roanoke-bound customers who traveled with Omni arrived Wednesday afternoon and evening on four flights - two days later than planned. Martin Travel Inc. of Roanoke had one flight that arrived in Roanoke about 6 a.m. Wednesday.
Mel Ludovici, Martin Travel's president, was out of town and could not be reached for comment. Officials from Georgia-based Worldwide Event, which booked the charter flights for Martin Travel, also could not be reached.
Much of the focus on the stranded Hokie fans, however, has been on those who planned their trips with Omni. The group of 500 fans, who waited out the weather and confusion at two downtown New Orleans hotels Monday and Tuesday, were featured on television and in the newspaper in New Orleans as well as in media coverage in Roanoke.
The attention put the small Blacksburg travel company in the spotlight - and on the hot seat. But there were other players involved in the ill-fated return trip. Omni contracted with Florida-based One by Air, a public tour and charter company, for five planes that would take 835 people to New Orleans from Richmond and Roanoke and back. One by Air then contracted with AV Atlantic, a charter airline based in Florida, to actually run the flights.
The two flights back to Richmond arrived Monday as planned, but Roanoke Regional Airport was fogbound from 9:30 a.m. Monday to 7 a.m. Tuesday, preventing the three other flights from landing. The Cowleys, who also went to the Sugar Bowl on the chartered flights, said they arranged for reduced hotel rates at the Hyatt Regency and Doubletree Inn for the travelers.
"I made the call that I didn't want to put people in the air, circle the airport and put people at risk," Patti Cowley said Thursday at her office, her eyes red from exhaustion and tears.
Cowley added that she fully expected the charter flights to take off Tuesday. In fact, many of the stranded Hokie fans were loaded into four buses and taken to the airport early Tuesday to what they thought were waiting planes after Cowley was told by One by Air that the flights would be ready to go. When they got there, however, there were no planes.
The confusion and misinformation continued throughout the day from One by Air and AV Atlantic, Cowley said, leading her to contact the Department of Transportation for help. When it became clear the flights would not leave until Wednesday, the Cowleys put up $9,500 for 119 rooms at the Hyatt and $4,500 for 53 rooms at the Doubletree.
They also paid an additional $4,000 for buses and hundreds of dollars for phone calls from their hotel room at the Hyatt. They already had invested $500,000 for the flights and hotel rooms.
Customers paid between $725 and $775 for travel packages, which included a round-trip flight and three nights at a hotel.
"We really, honestly thought at any moment the planes were going to be there. We were being told that," said Cowley, who added she likely would not make a profit from the trip. "With our reputation on the line and with people we care about, living in this community, why would we dupe anyone?''
John Gerbas, One by Air president, said the weather, combined with the lack of other charter flights available Tuesday, led to a domino effect that could not be avoided. However, Gerbas said he was angry with AV Atlantic, the charter airline he has worked with for five years, because it did not tell Cowley and his company the truth about the availability of planes on Tuesday.
"Patti Cowley got bad information. She was lied to," Gerbas said. "I was lied to. ... It was out of my control and certainly out of Patti's control. She went above and beyond the call."
But Elizabeth Forester, vice president of AV Atlantic, said she did not know who supplied that information. She added that her company had to honor the flights already planned to and from the Fiesta Bowl in Arizona, so there were no planes available to take people back to Roanoke.
"We had delays because of the weather," she said. "We did the best we could to get them back into Roanoke based on the weather."
LENGTH: Medium: 91 linesby CNB