We booked our flights independently from Greg and Leslie. It is quite a large plane with a 2 3 2 configuration. Stu and I are in row 21, seats A & C. Greg and Leslie are in row 20, seats A & C. Too funny.

Due to the snow in Toronto we were 3 hours late leaving. We had a hour and a half layover in Bogota that been eaten up and then some!! The first flight from Bogota to Quito in the morning is about 6:40am. It looks like we will arrive about 1:30, so no point in finding accomodation. Looks like we will be spending our second night in an airport in less than a year. Boo.

We spend 15 minutes de-icing before we took off. As we were taxing down the runway with increasing speed, we heard a big “BANG” just before we left the ground. YIKES. Not long after takeoff a flight attendant came back to Greg and Leslie to ask if they saw anything fall off of the plane when we heard the big bang. They said they saw nothing, but definitely heard the bang. She acknowledged that it was a big bang. Shortly after that the Captain came on with an announcement that some people on the left side of the aircraft (our side) saw some flames just after the noise. They are in contact with ground crews in Toronto to see if there was any debris left on the runway after we left. He went on to explain that it could be a compressor stall or they wondered if it had something to do with the nose wheel tire!!!! Sounds kind of scary. Hopefully we hear good news from the ground crew soon.

Update from ground staff, no rubber debris on the runway. It seems likely it is the compressor stall. There is a technical team logging on to the aircraft to see if everything looks OK.

7:13 Captain makes an announcement that we are turning around to go back to Toronto as a precaution. The technical team did not find anything, but would still like us to return to Toronto as they feel more confident being in Toronto if anything goes wrong. We should be landing back in Toronto about 8pm. Instructions to follow the cabin crew instructions in preparation for landing. There will be a visual inspection of the engine area when we land before we continue to a gate.

We arrived back in Toronto after doing some circling to burn off fuel. When we did land it was a beautiful smooth landing. 🙂 There is a large contingent of emergency vehicles with lights flashing to greet us. After we taxi close to the terminal the aircraft is examined visually by fire crews.

After returning to the terminal we are told that we will be leaving again at midnight. If we leave at midnight, a six hour flight will get us into Bogota about 6am. The 6:40 flight might be a tight connection.

We are also told that our boarding passes will get us $20 credit towards food. There is a miscommunication as the restaurants only want to give us $15. They relent and treat us well.

The new aircraft we will board is coming from Barbados. It was delayed getting to the gate due to the snow. We are now delayed to 1am. After boarding we do leave the gate just before 1 but do not lift off until 1:35 due to de-icing and taxing to the correct runway, This time no BANG. Nice.

The flight is long, we are very tired and uncomfortable as we try to sleep on the plane. I am not very good at this.

We land in Bogota and as we disembark the plane there are customer service people greeting us with new boarding passes and directions to our next gate. It is 7:30am (ish) and our next flight is 1:35. About 6 hours to kill in the Bogota airport (which is very nice)

I am writing this as we sit in recliner type chairs, much more civilized than the seats with arm rests that make lying down very difficult.

Will post more later with a few cell phone photos