Airlines used to hold departures if they knew your incoming flight had arrived and you were probably sprinting across the terminal. At least once I was running down the jetway and they were holding the door ready to close. Another time there were a half dozen of us with the same connection and they had a van waiting for us - we took the stairs from the jet bridge that the ground crew uses down to the van, drove over to the connecting flight, then up those stairs to the door of the plane. Good thing we all were able to climb stairs.
It’s still done. Just not all the time. The mere fact someone is running is not a guarantee of holding their outbound. But it is very common to be held in place for connections at the hub.
The counterargument is you’re forcing that outbound flight to be late, and maybe late back to the hub, making all of those passengers late for their connections 2 or 5 hours from now. So trading e.g. 4 misconnects now for a planeload of misconnects in 4 hours. Sometimes there’s enough slack in the system to permit that, sometimes there is not.
At least where I worked they were trying diligently to have the automation make these decisions smartly, doing as much delayed passenger accommodation now as they could without painting themselves into a corner 4 or 6 hours hence. It didn’t work perfectly, and there were certainly times when accommodations like holding flights simply can’t be done. But they were / are trying.
I was flying to Paris with a connection in London. Our first leg was late and then I had to traverse the quite large Heathrow airport. I made it to the gate with something like 10 minutes to spare. But, their rules were you had to board no later than 15 minutes prior to departure.
I was floored they would not let me on. The plane was right there! Not moving, air bridge still in place. Plane door still open.
They wouldn’t budge. I had to spend six hours at Heathrow for the next flight I could get. Not fun. (I did talk them into letting me use the Admiral’s Club though so that was a little help.)
Oh…and my bags got lost. I got them later but had to spend 90 minutes farting around in Charles de Gaulle Airport trying to get my luggage…which didn’t catch up to me until Madrid a few days later.
I was on a plane and (a different time) a cruise where it was explained to us they had to leave the gate/pier because other planes/ships needed that gate/pier. Even if they wanted to wait they simply could not.
Well I meant “sprinting through the airport” as a metaphor for “is on the ground”, not doing the full OJ (wow, that can be taken in a different contaxt). And the experiences I described were long enough ago that flights were not scheduled as tightly as they are now (is that true or am I misremembering?).
A few years back my flight from PHX to PHL (American hub-to-hub) had mechanical problems. Rather than cancel our flight they canceled the flight a few gates over (not heading to another hub) and gave us that plane. I assume for similar reasons of a net minimization of disruptions.
Yeah … “Runner” is an industry term for “plane at the gate w connecting passengers presumably heading towards their outbound flight”. Net of immigration, customs, TSA, long hikes, etc.
I’m reminded of one time when my O’Hare to RDU flight was cancelled and they rescheduled me for another flight the next morning. Except that instead of a direct flight they put me on a flight to LaGuardia, and then a changeover to a flight to RDU. When I got to LaGuardia I found out that in order to get to my departure gate I had to go through security again. Fortunately this was before 9/11 so the line wasn’t long, but by the time I got to my departure gate the plane was already boarding. I’m not sure how long, or if, they would have held the plane for me.