Original essay - I flew from Ohio to Georgia Sunday night

I flew from Ohio to Georgia Sunday night, while the world and the airline industry were still recovering from Friday's mass computer failure. My flight was delayed by about 3 hours. It was the last flight of the evening, and only the second Delta departure on Sunday. They'd managed only one plane Friday and another on Saturday. The Dayton airport was nearly empty when I got there.
 
When I arrived in Atlanta, the airport looked like a refuge camp, or a Circle of Hell. We'd been delayed taking off and rerouted to different gates twice after landing, nearly doubling the length of an otherwise short flight. Every seat in the gate area was full, and most of the floorspace. People reclined, laid down, slept, or tried to stay awake. They looked like they'd been there too long already, and there was no end in sight.
 
I passed a queue of people twenty gates long, stretching from C10 to C30. I don't know what they were lined up for - no one plane could hold them all. Most of the shops had their lights off and security gates locked. Starbucks was closed temporarily while they waited for an emergency resupply. One cart had just arrived, and I passed two more, stacked my height with boxes, as I walked to the end of the concourse. The arrival and departure boards were a sea of red, every flight delayed or canceled. Every gate was full of people, waiting, waiting. A few people ran, to catch connecting flights perhaps, but it looked almost insane to hurry in this place where so few moved at all.
 

departure screens showing flight delays, image by me

 
The plane train was out of order. There was no sign, no announcement, but I gathered from the way no one else stopped to wait for it, and I let myself become part of the crowd, the tide flowing toward the baggage claims and exits. From the moving walkways I saw people lying against the walls. Between the C and B concourses there are museum-like displays, tables covered in text. Each of those prime spots was claimed by a large White man using it as a shelter. One use the plug point to power his CPAP machine while he slept, the mask just visible beneath a baseball cap worn over his face.
 
The next plane train station was completely full. I realized that half the loop was closed, so instead of its usual continuous operation, it was now bussing back and forth along a single piece of track. The train arrived, going our way, the doors opened. Some squeezed in, but there wasn't enough room, not nearly enough room for everyone. I kept walking. Between B and A the lights are dimmed, the decor a mock forest. No one could lay down on these floors because there were simply too many people. People with no gate, no flight, no hotel, nowhere to go, nothing to do but wait. So they sat and hugged their knees, tried to keep their bags close, read their phones or tried to sleep. On the moving walkway, I coasted past them, a fortunate spectator, with nothing but luck and chance to thank for the improvement of my condition over theirs.
 
Past the A concourse an overflowing crowd blocked the exit. The walkway, insensate and mechanical, conveyed us forward at a steady speed, the world's weakest unstoppable force, propelling us into an immovable mass of our fellows. The regular path ahead was closed, everyone was being routed onto an escalator. I saw a man lose his balance and begin to topple backwards, but those in front of me caught him and set him right. Again, the machine worked at its prescribed pace, and dumped us at the top into another too close crowd. I nearly fell, and tried, even as I regained myself, to hurry out of the way, to avoid bumping anyone behind me like a domino.
 
We took an irregular route to the ticketing counters, the baggage claims, the exits. Half the hallway was coned off for cleaning, funneling us more narrowly, claustrophobically than the space itself might allow. Atlanta's security was closed and caged off. No one else was getting in tonight, and the only ones leaving were those of us with somewhere to go. I passed through revolving doors I've never seen or used before, and arrived in the main lobby. A few people waited by nearly empty luggage carousels. Between them, hundreds of suitcases were lined up and cordonded off. The luggage office was full and overflowed, more suitcases standing, waiting, in front of the glass doors.
 
Finally, finally, I took the last escalator down to the shuttle that would take me to my parking lot. I was out.
 
 
Note: I don't know how often I'll write original essays to post here, but this experience was strange enough, and noteworthy enough, that I felt I had to write something down about it.