I made it to the airport just fine. Going through the security check the guy looked at my ticket and I guess decided I had time to spare so he did a secondary search of me. What this means is that he patted me down and then went through my pack.
At the gate everything was fine until it was 10 minutes before the plane was supposed to take off and we hadn't boarded yet. The lady came on the speaker and said there was a computer glitch so they were just waiting to receiving confirmation on boarding from the crew. 20 minutes later she announced the cancellation of the flight to Seattle that was supposed to leave from the same gate 20 minutes after ours. She still wasn't sure about our flight though. At this point she was swarmed by the people from the Seattle flight who she gave hotel vouchers to and a phone number to call to rebook. For some people who had come in on another flight she helped them find an alternative out.
After this she talked to people on her radio every 20 minutes or so and always got a response of "we'll decide momentarily whether to cancel" or "just a moment..." Eventually though, at about the time our flight was supposed to have landed in Portland, she finally announced it was canceled. At this point it didn't really matter to me as I would have missed my connection anyway.
We then had to go back through customs, even filling out the form, and pick up our bags as if we were arriving from the US. Naturally our bags took a while to get there. Finally I headed over to the Air Canada counter to find a huge line-up. It was made up of the Seattle passengers as while as the canceled flights of Nanaimo, Whitehorse and Edmonton. A lady told us that if we didn't need a hotel for the night we shouldn't bother getting in line but should instead phone the Air Canada number to rebook.
I phoned the number but of course I was put on hold indefinitely. Since there was no more flights until morning I started taking transit home while still on hold. Unfortunately a short tunnel cut off my phone call. At this point I decided to try a different strategy since everyone else was phoning Air Canada. I phoned Expedia who I booked the trip through. They said it was the airlines that I had to deal with in rebooking my flights. My second and third flight were with Continental so I got their number from her and managed to get a hold of someone after being hung up on accidentally and at this point I was halfway home.
The guy at Continental was really awesome, booking me flights for the next day to get me all the way from Vancouver to Philadelphia. Unfortunately it's going to involve a long lay over in Houston and I won't get in until 12 hours after the original plan. Hopefully this plan actually goes through.
In the meantime, YVR is actually pretty great to hang out in. There is free wifi, no shortage of tables, and a Burger King that appears to be open all night.
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