At Burbank Airport, Chaos Seizes the Day

When Kevin Head lies in bed at night, counting like sheep the reasons he hates busy airports during the holiday season, this will be the day that comes painfully first to mind.

It was the Motherlode of Nightmares, the day you couldn’t get there from here--Burbank Airport, that is.

First, on Tuesday night, United Airlines canceled Head’s flight to Humboldt County, in Northern California, promising he’d be on the first flight out Wednesday morning. Then, that flight was canceled. Head, an art student attending school in Pasadena, showed up at the airport at 1 p.m., only to be told that, if he ran, he might catch a 1:05 p.m. flight on tiny Reno Air.

The problem was: Reno was on the other side of the airport.

So there he was, two heavy bags slung across each shoulder, one in each hand--running, stumbling, crawling through the crowded terminal, cursing under his breath, bags flying this way and that, bumping fellow passengers like you would kiddies at the roller-skating rink.

When he reached the gate, he dropped his bags and ran to check in. He had made the flight. As puzzled workers looked on, he pounded the counter: “I made it! I made it!”

Isn’t traveling during the holidays so much fun? Hardly.

The day before Thanksgiving, traditionally the busiest day of the year for airport travel. At Burbank Airport, business was up 30% on Wednesday as more than 20,000 homebound travelers pushed their way through the turnstiles.

For many, the airport was the scene of so many rats trying to leave the ship--all at once.

It was like some time-lapsed film of busy Grand Central Station--California style. The hordes stampeded off arriving flights, leaving those waiting racing anxiously to claim their place in lines.

Cars honked at pedestrians who jumped in their paths. Few people uttered a “sorry” or an “excuse me.” It was every traveler for himself.

“On days like these, people’s true colors show through loud and clear,” said Head, now sitting near the gate catching his breath. “In line at United, people were yelling insults at the reservation workers. They were swearing at them! Calling them no better than postal workers.

“When I was running for my flight, two of my bags broke at the handles. Nobody, and I mean nobody, stopped to help. It was like frenzied zombies, all running for flights. Human nature at its lowest ebb.”

For many travelers, traffic cops, parking attendants, security workers, toilet scrubbers, airline reservationists--the people who make the airport world go ‘round--it was the day they love to hate.

“It drives me crazy,” said Ronald Licup, an airport security worker, as he supervised the walk-through X-ray machines. “People are rushing to catch their flights. They’ve got too many bags in their hands. They get mad if the bell on the security gate goes off.

“I mean, they blame it on us that they forgot to take their keys out of their pockets. I tell them, ‘Hey, we’re just trying to make your flight more safe from a security standpoint. You want to get to where you’re going, right?’ Sheesh. But when things get real bad, we all tell ourselves, ‘Hey, at least we don’t work at LAX.’ With all the people they handle, there’s a real nightmare.”

Outside, two parking security officers were writing a teen-age driver a ticket for parking too long in the loading zone. When a passerby approached the trio, one officer snapped: “Hey, you got a problem? Can’t you see we’re conducting business here? Move along.”

Burbank Police Sgt. J. P. Campo, a regular on the airport beat, agreed that ‘tis the season for flaring tempers. “It’s tough,” he said. “I just tell my officers, ‘Go out there and have fun.’ ”

At the Southwest Airlines desk, a flight to Oakland was canceled indefinitely. People rushed to telephones to tell family members to hold off on that drive to the airport.

“I want to be with my family,” said Marilyn Gold of Tarzana. “I’ll do anything to get there. Anything.”

At the gate, the reservationists were swamped with questions and concerns. “Most people are understanding,” said one worker.

She was interrupted by a man: “This could take months, right? Do you think we might make it by next Thanksgiving?”

Added another traveler: “Hey, maybe we could all drive there more quickly.”

Fifty or so people back in the line to make reservations, Bruce Carney waited with the patience of a saint. After all, the software salesman and frequent flier had seen bad days before.

“People here don’t know how good they’ve got it,” he said. “You want to see airport chaos? Go to Chicago and add the prospect of bad weather. Now, that’s confusion. Out here, it’s always spring. People will get where they’re going. They should just relax.”

Along with harried travelers were the people who weren’t going anywhere. People like Father Robert Buntzler of the Universal Life Church. During the holidays, he stands with his sign and plastic bucket, trying to solicit donations from travelers for numerous causes.

On busy days, the response he gets ain’t exactly pretty.

“It depends, some people are rude,” he says. “But others are in a good mood. They’re going home to be with family. They don’t give me any more money. But they don’t knock me over, either.”

At LAX, thousands of passengers struggled with the lingering aftereffects of labor actions at both American and United airlines, determined to get where they were going by dinner time today.

Traveler Scott Perlmutter was hoping to find a last-minute American Airlines seat that would take him to Miami.

“My original flight was canceled two days ago. I’m going to plead to get on today if I have to,” the 30-year-old Beverly Hills resident said.

American Airlines worker Vivianne Cardoza gave Perlmutter a motherly hug. “Don’t worry. We’ll get you home for Thanksgiving,” she promised. “Only three flights out of 65 that we have here today have been canceled.”

In the Burbank Airport bar, bartender Joii Goodman has seen it all--men in the nearby gift shop sneaking Playboy magazines along with their New York Times. She’s seen people break down and cry at certain delays over the holidays.

But many of her customers take the inevitable delays and bad news of holiday travel in stride: “I ask people, ‘What the heck, you have to wait. You can get a double shot for a dollar more. And they say, ‘Hey, I’m on vacation.’ It always works.”

Then one customer spoke up: “Not for me, it doesn’t work. If I drank another drop, I’d have to tinkle before the plane even got near San Francisco.”

Back at the Reno Air gate, Kevin Head was wondering what else could go wrong in this waking travel nightmare. Could the plane leave without him? Would the wings fall off? Or, like the woozy passenger in that old “Twilight Zone” episode, would he see some monster lurking outside the plane during the flight?

“At this point, I don’t know,” he said. “I just know one thing. I’m driving back. I’m not flying. Enough is enough.”

Times staff writer Bob Pool contributed to this story.