TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin sad to be back home after JB flight from He@ll

4:55 pm flight from SXM left 10:30 pm

Lesley's wife Shirley was waiting at departures for our car and had wheelchair waiting at 1:30. Always a pleasure doing business with Kenny's Car rental.

Rolled up to Mosaic window at Jet Blue and was told flight delayed. Decided to push on through, up elevator, through TSA and on to gate A1. Waited, announcement flight delay again. We were offered food vouchers $12 each = $24 went to Baccus and purchased one tuna sub, one water $20. Split them with Don.

JB announcement "sorry for the delay, gate now changed A4" clear across the room, gentleman who pushed Don's wheelchair was the son of Marie, one of the maids at BSV. Sweet guy.

Finally boarded plane around 10, i think. About 8 people where allowed to pass the wheelchairs lined up. Of course not only our line but others upset asking what's up. When we were finally allowed to board we passed these people at a table, agents going through their luggage. Don't know what that was all about unless they somehow found a way to bypass TSA? One was a young woman who they made remove her sweatshirt for some reason. There she stood in her bra as we all passed.

Aboard, steward very helpful with getting our carryon into the overhead. Too tired to watch any movie, dozed on and off. Upon arrival JB announced that we please hurry off the plane because customs usually quits at midnight but that JB got a couple of agents to stay late. One guy joked that we may not get thru customs and have to stay. But if we were illegally crossing border we'd get right in plus be given $1000. Visa.

Now JB requested that those who boarded via wheelchair please wait until everyone deplaned. Funny how many/all except Don & I walked off the plane. Being last we expected another end of line at customs but the joke was one them because wheel chair "pusher" brought us direct to customs agents and we saw others with carryon waiting in a group while others still waited for their checked luggage.

Sorry this post is getting long. Called the Hilton Garden Inn shuttle to pick us us. Fortunately I had booked for the return so we didn't have to drive home in the dark. Checked in about 1:15 am, showered , bed. Up at 8:30 am down to get our free hot breakfast before checking out. Drove home with a stop for bread and milk. Unpacked and here I sit typing this post.

Ready to go back again. Great time had despite some complaints.

OK sorry the flight was so delayed, but glad you arrived home ok.

The secondary checks are pretty common at the table and random for the most part (they call out a list of names on the loud speaker). They just check for illegal substances and bomb making material I guess. Nothing about skipping passport control.

Okay, didn't know that so thanks for that information.

I've had to go through that once in the past. It has to do with a code or something on your boarding pass they'll see upon boarding. Just so you know there isn't TSA at PJIA.

Departed SXM at 1030p and checked into the Hilton at 115a...that's weird but great time considering it's around a 4 hour flight. That delay really sucks....

I too had this random check while flying silver air to sju. They pulled a couple of us over, explosives checked us then gave us the silver (I will see myself out) treatment.

We were escorted to board first... and random guy #2 sat beside me in a mostly full flight... we joked how two randoms gave us a shared experience to chat about to pass the time away.

Though, if I unexpectedly was in public in my bra... I am soooo sorry for that lady's experience.

Happy to hear you made it home.

My wife must look like terrorist over 18 years she had a secondary check 3 times. You are randomly selected when you check in

I got the dreaded “SSSS” code on my boarding pass leaving SXM this summer and got my incredibly thorough secondary screening at the gate. I had hoped that with the new departure hall and new screening equipment that would be done away with… but I guess not.

Here’s a tip if you do see SSSS on your boarding pass at SXM. Give all of your stuff to someone else traveling with you if you can. They searched me up and down but didn’t check my wife and two kids at all.

Good advice.

I was told by a gate agent that you get the the SSSS depending on your form of payment (like cash when you could pay in cash) or if you book your ticket to close to the departure date. But most likely random. I would agree if you have every really done much international travel that getting though many airports can take hours. You can do things to help make you trip better but Traveling to anywhere is not what it was years ago so relax or stay home maybe. SXM is really pretty good most of the time. IMO

I booked my flight 320 days before departure and paid with my JetBlue credit card. I’m also TSA precheck (not that that applies in SXM, but JetBlue still has it on my profile). It’s 100% random. In the US if you get tagged with the SSSS they do your secondary screening at the checkpoint. Seems quite silly to do it the way they do at SXM at the gate. 🤷‍♂️

Yes, we all surprised when pilot announced arrival expected to be 12:30pm. Didn't make sense until someone said there must not be much traffic ha ha, Not sure how he did it except for fact we had a tail wind.

And as I said we were out of customs about 1 am then shuttle to hotel.

I’m not questioning your account RonDon because the data isn’t always right… but if this is the right flight flightaware shows you leaving at 8:33pm AST arriving at 12:15am EDT.

https://www.flightaware.com/live/flight/JBU1878/history/20240323/2105Z/TNCM/KBOS

So sorry you had such an awful trip home; definitely takes the shine off of a wonderful vacation. You're fortunate that the hotel shuttle runs after midnight; we often have to uber or taxi to our hotel. Just one more annoyance and $20 wasted after a long day.

What a LONG travel day. Sorry you had to go through that.

Welcome home!

I'm losing my loyalty to JB! Our 2 delays out of Boston and arriving in the dark, yuk!

My two go to airlines out of BOS are Delta and JB BUT JB checked bag arrival in BOS is horrible. Usually around 30 minute wait but our last trip from SXM took 55 minutes .....after two gate changes and a two hour flight delay at JFK we finally took our 39 minute flight to BOS.

I emailed corporate at JB and recieved a call a few days later saying they were sorry for the baggage delay

Delta is usually the opposite...bags pretty quick.

Hubby says you are right we we supposed to leave at 4:55 then 10:30 then we left around 8:30. Sorry for giving misinformation. I even questioned 12:15 arrival based on my thought we'd left around 10. Instead of correcting me hubby said I must have dozed off.

The SSSS CAN mean you are on a watch list erroneously. After getting that SSSS for the fifth year in a row, I looked and discovered that my name was on a watchlist. Though it is NOT me that is on the watch list. I applied for the Traveler Redress Inquiry and 4 months later, was removed from that list. It's odd because I also have Global Entry. So, I've been through a lot of security.
Anyway, two years now without the SSSS on my boarding pass.

And eightzerobits is correct. You can just give your travelling companion all your stuff. It's really kind of dumb.