My collegue reminded me last week of an incident that took place back in July 2002 when we worked together the first time at my old job at (then) VGM. For whatever the reason was (I can’t remember: I guess I’m getting Alzheimers), I ordered a dozen red roses online with 1-800-Flowers for my girlfriend Carrie. Since it was an overnight delivery it was going to be handled by FedEx. As usual I got a tracking number so I could see where the package was. I always liked this feature and the way you can see where your stuff is in time and space so to say. However, this time my roses would never reach my girlfriend. They got burned to a crisp… So what happened?
While I was at work I was following my roses as FedEx was shipping them around the US. It caught my attention that they were shipped all across the US. First they got picked up at Miami airport. Then they got shipped to Fort Lauderdale. From Fort Lauderdale they got shipped out of state to Memphis, Tennesee. When I checked the FedEx site later that day, it suddenly said my dozen roses were all the way in Colorado Springs! What the heck? Why the hell did it go all the way to Colorado? The message was rather cryptic; “delay beyond our control”. Off course I paid enough money for the flowers, and I did use FedEx because I wanted them to be in time at my girlfriends work. So what was going on?
Luckily 1-800-Flowers has a good customer service, so I started an online chat-session to find out what was going on. I explained to the customer service person what I had noticed: my flowers wound up in a totally different place then supposed. I remember asking her what the status of my delivery was. Then she typed: “Oh my god: the plane crashed”. For a second there I thought she was pulling my leg. I wanted to type: “well, at least that’s an original excuse”. Instead I opened another window and checked the CNN Web front page.
I could not believe it: it said that FedEx flight 1478 actually *did* crash at Tallahassee regional Airport, it’s final destination. The whole plane had burned and so did it’s cargo. The crew escaped with relative minory injuries; some good news with the bad news I guess.
Still flabbergasted I reported in the chat to the sales rep: “yeah, I can’t believe it either but you’re right, it’s on CNN”. After a few seconds I figured I should ask the more important question: “So, what now?”. The sales rep then suggested that 1-800-Flowers would alter my order (afterall: I already had paid for it with my credit card) into a florist delivered order. “No extra charges, and we do apologize for the inconvenience”. Wow. And the best thing: they would still be there on the same day!
Then I asked if I could add another card to my flowers. The answer was “Sure, just tell me what you want on it”. I don’t remember the exact words, but I added a message saying something like; “I love you, and by the way: no plane crash can keep these flowers away from you”.
It turned out that my message was a little to cryptic for my girlfriend. She had heard of the crash, but did not link it with my card and me sending flowers. But after I explained all what happened, I guess she was impressed too. I mean: how big are the chances of you buying something and then the plane that ships it crashes? I would say cosmical small. In fact you probably have a bigger chance of winning the lottery or at being struck by lightning. My collegues could hardly believe my story – it did sound far fetched – untill I provided some hard evidence for them.
To this day I have saved a printout of both the webpage from FedEX and CNN together with the 1-800-Flowers sales slip. You can view this evidence below 🙂
A full report on the crash (that turned out to be a momumental error by the pilot and co-pilot) can be found at the Airdisaster Accident database.
Here is what happened (click on any image for a larger view):
How is that for a cool story?