Ruby Ferguson was coming home to Stonewall for Christmas and flying alone for the first time. Unfortunately, the weather had other plans for her flight.
“It was pretty scary. Nobody knew what was happening,” says Ferguson.
Kiandra Doerksen was on the same flight as Ferguson from Vancouver to Winnipeg on Dec. 22. Doerksen moved away two and a half years ago and was flying back to Winnipeg for the holidays. She says she likes to open the maps app on her phone while the plane is still on the ground so she can track her location because many of the budget airlines don’t have a way to track how far into the flight you are.
“Right before we were going to hit the ground, the plane shot straight back up into the air. I thought it was weird,” says Doerksen.
Doerksen says she watched the plane circle around to Oak Bluff and then try to descend again, but the same thing happened. Eventually, the map revealed that they were flying over Kenora.
The flight crew finally came on the loudspeaker, explaining that the flight was rerouting to Toronto due to the fog in Winnipeg. They said there would be gate agents waiting, but no one was there when they deplaned.
“Other airlines were going to Winnipeg, but Lynx wasn’t going that day so people were getting really mad about that,” says Ferguson.
After waiting at the airport for a few hours, Lynx rebooked them on a flight from Toronto to Winnipeg the following morning and provided hotel and food vouchers. When Ferguson and Doerksen returned the following morning on Dec. 23, the flight got delayed by two hours. Shortly after, it was cancelled.
Lynx offered them a flight on Dec. 25 that would arrive in Winnipeg around 8 p.m.. The other option was to get a flight voucher or refund, but that meant everyone had to get back to their destinations themselves.
According to Ferguson and Doerksen, angry passengers surrounded the Lynx counter.
“I’ve seen videos on Instagram or Facebook of situations like this, but I’ve never seen it in person. Eventually, some managers and people in uniform showed up. But it’s kind of hard because it’s all weather-related,” says Doerksen.
“I was crying because I was really overwhelmed after the last few days of travel,” says Ferguson.
Doerksen approached Ferguson, told her she wasn’t alone in how she felt, and invited her to join in on the plan she had started to put together with a few other people of getting a rental car and driving back to Winnipeg.
Once a few other passengers realized how much it would cost to fly with another airline back to Winnipeg (around $1,000), they also joined. The group steadily grew until seven people were committed to doing the 21-hour drive.
The group pooled their food vouchers to stock up on food and drinks for the drive and went to rent a van that would seat seven. Once they arrived at Hertz they found out there was nothing available. As they were trying to figure out what to do, the person at the desk double-checked, and someone had returned a van.
“It wasn’t even clean, but we said we’d take it,” says Doerksen. “It was super lucky.”
“It’s funny being in a tight vehicle with a bunch of people you don’t know because what do you even talk about? But there’s also so much to talk about.”
Ferguson said most of them moved from Manitoba to Vancouver and were all bonding over things like how you can’t get honey dill anywhere other than Manitoba and talking about socials. She said they were also playing travel games together. They only stopped a few times for gas because they only had the rental car for 24 hours.
“We were all on a mission to get home for Christmas,” says Ferguson. “My mom was calling Lynx, trying to help me get home…she was crying when I finally saw her. It was a really sweet moment.”
They arrived in Winnipeg on Dec. 24 ahead of schedule. Doerksen says she checked the Dec. 25 flight they would’ve been rebooked on, and it never took off, so they would’ve been stuck even longer if it hadn’t been for driving. In the end, the total cost for the gas and van rental was $120 per person.
Situations like this aren’t uncommon. In 2022, heavy snowfall led to unprecedented flight cancellations across Canada, stranding passengers from coast to coast.
After everything Doerksen and Ferguson have gone through, they will stay in touch and added each other on Instagram as a way to stay in touch.
