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Surviving a Cancelled Flight 101: What to Buy at the Airport

Now that Hurricane Sandy is upon the East Coast and canceling flights in droves, we're dedicating today to using all our travel know-how (and some on-the-fly advice, as half the Jaunted team is stuck at airports as well) to help you ride out the storm despite delayed travel. Stay tuned and stay safe!

You're stuck. You're cranky. You're uncomfortable. If you're lucky, your home (until you can fly out) will be a hotel or the living room of a friend, but many will find themselves sleeping at the airport and that's just no fun. Here, however, are Five items you can buy at the airport to survive the next couple days:

· Beach Towel: Not only does it soften a sleep on the floor or hard chairs, but it's also effective as a dirt barrier between you and whatever is on that floor/soaked into the waiting area chairs. Spread it out on a blanket to curl up on, roll it up to use as a pillow or cover yourself with it like a blanket for privacy or warmth. There are many uses for something so simple, and luckily it should be cheap enough to throw out once your flight does board and depart.

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American Airlines Ponies Up Bonus Miles for Hurricane Isaac Donations

Good news if you're feeling charitable this week as American Airlines is offering AAdvantage members a chance to earn bonus miles while doing good.

American is encouraging members to make a donation of $50 or more to the American Red Cross for the victims of Hurricane Issac and, in exchange, get bonus miles deposited to their AAdvantage account. Through October 1, 2012, AAdvantage members can earn 250 miles for a minimum $50 donation, or 500 miles for a donation of $100 or more.

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Total Flights Cancelled by Hurricane Isaac (So Far): 742

"What's going with Hurricane Isaac?" It's a question we've heard all weekend and, now with the meat of the week ahead, one that won't die until the winds do.

According to The Weather Channel's nice little map above, it's the Gulf Coast that's now in the crosshairs, the Keys having been spared everything but a good storming. And though Isaac has only begun to make the coast sweat, the airlines have been in go-mode since the middle of last week.

Heck, Southwest instagrammed a shot of their emergency satellite phones, all packed up and ready to ship out to airport crew on Friday. Meanwhile, they and AirTran were loading up the schedule with extra flights from Florida ahead of the storm.

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The Jauntys / Jaunted Awards 2011 / Travel Awards 2011 / Earthquakes / Hurricanes / Travel Alerts / → All Tags

The Biggest Travel Villain of 2011 Is...

It's that time of the year again, the time when the year just plain ends. Alas, we can't just let 2011 go that easily, especially since travelers spent it both up in the air and up in arms over a crazy range of topics, encompassing everything from nudie scans to tarmac delays. Needless to say, we're ready for 2012, but first we're taking a brief look back at the best of 2011 with the Jaunted Travel Awards,—or as we fondly refer to them—The Jauntys.

Do you think we're going to say "TSA" for this year's biggest travel villain? Truthfully, we were tempted but they won the title in 2010 and it's time to move on. For 2011, the single biggest villain keeping travelers from where they wanted to go were...natural disasters.

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Hurricane Rina Heads for Cancun, Cuba

Update 10/27: Good news! Hurricane Rina should be downgraded to a Tropical Storm and will likely only make it as far as Cuba. Nonetheless, the projected path continues to change. Follow updates here.

Just in case you don't instinctively flip to the Weather Channel during TV commercial breaks, we should tell you that this weekend is probably not the best time to be vacationing in Cancun, the rest of the Riviera Maya, and even in the Florida Keys as Hurricane Rina bears down on the vacation destinations.

As a result of the impending arrival of 80-40mph winds and potentially damaging Category 2 hurricane, cruise ships in the area have shifted their routes and airlines are offering rebooking for those traveling into the storm. An example is JetBlue, who have the alert clearly stated at the top of their website, and the full rebooking details here.

The worst of the storm is due to land on Cozumel and Cancun tomorrow, while it'll take until the weekend to dampen the Florida Keys* (see update above). Thankfully it's only a Category 2 (for now), so tourists already enjoying the sun and who don't mind weather disruptions, shouldn't be worried for their lives. The real threat is to those still planning on travel during the storm days, as they'll likely just end up sleeping on airport floors.

[Photo: Weather Channel]

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When a Hurricane Threatens, Airplanes Go Into Hiding

In just a few hours, New York City's airports should be back up and functioning somewhat normally after a weekend of shut down due to the threat posed by Hurricane Irene. Thankfully the airports are still around at all, since New York did not get as hard as everyone expected, even though JFK lies way out in the mandatory evacuation zone.

In order to get flights heading out on schedule, airlines must fling their planes back to the airports in the first place. You see, when a severe storm approaches such as a hurricane, an effort is made to clear the airport of planes and put them into "hiding" at other airports as much as possible. Nobody wants to see an overturned or damaged multi-million dollar flying machine after some wind and rain.

During Irene, one of the airlines most transparent about their emergency procedures was JetBlue. Not only are they being proactive about rebooking customers on Twitter (just have a look at their feed), but their COO Rob Maruster shared this pic of a deserted Terminal 5 at JFK with storm clouds overhead.

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The National Hurricane Museum is Looking Pretty Good on Paper

Hopefully you got enough hurricane action this week to hold you over for a long time, but if not there’s always the National Hurricane Museum and Science Center. Here you can relive some of Mother Nature’s fury through interactive exhibits all while remaining safe and sound—and dry!

The only issue is that the place isn’t open yet, as they’re still trying to raise enough funding to debut the place in Lake Charles, Louisiana. There’s a vote this fall for residents to give their blessing to build the place on the downtown lakefront, but in the interim they’d love a donation or two.

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Is Your Weekend in the Projected Path of Hurricane Earl?

The weather is still dry here in New York City, even though weathermen promised that the wrath of Hurricane Earl would be felt in high winds and heavy rain by now. Earl, however, seems a bit late to our Labor Day long weekend and we hope he doesn't come to the picnic at all.

According to the Weather Channel, the hurricane has decreased to a Category 2-level storm, but that doesn't mean that it'll end up being just a nice summer rainstorm by the time it hits Cape Cod Saturday. Luckily for everyone, Earl has kept far enough off the coast to only generate wind, rain and waves and none of the scary stuff that makes you fear your house could fall around you. Peak winds are 105 mph, but that's offshore.

The estimated hurricane path for the weekend has a fraction of that wind speed hitting the east coast above Long Island, until the bulk of the beast enters right into Canada's Bay of Fundy, between the provinces of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia, bringing only 65 mph winds with it at that point. Earl has already done his damage to North Carolina and the Outer Banks, causing storm surge waves to wreck piers and flood roads.

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Hurricane Earl Sets Its Sights on the Outer Banks, Jersey Shore and NYC

Now that Hurricane Danielle is out of the picture and out of the way of ruining vacations of people in Bermuda, we're tracking the progression of the next big Atlantic storm, one which could possibly do much, much more damage and throw the best-laid summer plans off track. It's Hurricane Earl, and he's coming for more than just the Bahamas; Earl is on course to hit the east coast over this upcoming weekend.

With the Turks and Caicos islands currently under a Hurricane warning, many cruise lines have altered their itineraries away from the Bahamas and the northbound path of the storm. Next up, North Carolina's Outer Banks will be bracing for the onslaught of 120mph winds and more, if Earl keeps it up. Following that, we can expect the Hurricane to hit the Jersey Shore and New York City early Saturday and Cape Code, MA slightly after, when the winds die down to less insane levels of somewhere around 60-70mph. Even though that's still plenty insane.

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The Atlantic Ocean's First Hurricane of the Season Heads for Bermuda

Somewhere off the coast of Bermuda right now, the winds are ripping and the waves are threatening. Hurricane Danielle is churning out in the Atlantic Ocean, and as the first hurricane of the Atlantic storm season and the fourth named storm overall, she won't be the last hurricane to hit the news.

The real question is if Danielle's 130mph winds will hurt tourism to Bermuda. Luckily, it looks the island famous for its pink sands will remain just out of Danielle's reach as the hurricane bypasses it on the east. There will be some weather consequences however, and flights to Bermuda this weekend could encounter some turbulence.

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Hurricane Ida Is In Your Caribbean, Messing With Your Cruises

You know the cruising season has begun when the hurricanes and tropical storms lay into the Caribbean; it's just a hazard of the peak season. Still, this week we've been watching the progress of Hurricane Ida, which began way down in Central America and worked its way due north, eroding beaches in Cozumel and Grand Cayman before just not being downgraded back to Tropical Storm in advance of landfall in Mississippi.

Most affected by the storm were two inaugural sailings of Carnival ships, the Fantasy and Triumph from new home ports of Mobile, Alabama and New Orleans, respectively. According to CruiseCritic, each voyage is now delayed by a day, turning a 6-nighter into 5 and Triumph's 4-nighter into 3 with no port calls; it's now a "cruise to nowhere."

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Hurricane Rick Swatting Cruise Ships Out Of The Way En Route To Baja

If there is something we know about traveling during the late summer thru early fall, it's to buy trip insurance. We're sure some cruisers and Baja vacationers will be finding out the importance of such policies as Hurricane Rick hits Baja Mexico and diverts ships away from holiday ports in order to avoid the 100 mph winds.

Although Rick has already crested in strength and now it peters down to a category 3 hurricane, let us remember that having a category anything storm crash your beach holiday is never positive. Judging the infographic above, Rick is zeroing in on Mexico like a frat boy with fantasies of cheap Patron. With the storm due off the coast from late today through early tomorrow, cruise ships are skipping visits to Mazatlan and possibly even Cabo San Lucas, adding insult to injury for the city that counts on these near-daily cruise ship calls.

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