Greetings from Warrington.
Wi-Fi is awesome

Ok, rule #1: Don't fly through Chicago
Rule #2: Don't fly United Airlines

Follow those rules for air travel, and you're pretty much set. I don't think I've ever had a United flight that wasn't delayed and I don't think I've ever gotten in or out of Chicago on time. But since the only time I fly United is when I'm going through Chicago and whenever I fly through Chicago, I fly United, I don't think those events are independent.

That being said....

My flight out of Orange County left an hour and a half late, largely because the plane coming in from Chicago was late due to thunderstorms. Considering I only had an hour and a half layover, that pretty much guaranteed I'd miss my connection in Chicago. Add to that that the flight had to fly more slowly going to Chicago to time their arrival in between thunderstorms, and I arrived about 30 minutes after my flight to Manchester left.

So, I run from the arrival terminal in Chicago (concourse B) to the British Midlands ticket counter in Terminal 5. They rebook me on a flight through London to Manchester. But the flight to London leaves from Concourse C, so I have to run all the way back (for those of you who know Chicago O'Hare, you know that I've gone from one end to the other and back). Fortunately, I had a couple hours before the flight to London left.

Of course, the plane that was going to London was coming from Washington D.C. and was also late because of the Chicago thunderstorms, so the flight to London left about 2 hours late. I didn't think it too much a problem because I had about a 3 hour layover in London.

About a couple hours into the flight, a flight attendant came over the PA "if there are any licensed medical professionals aboard, would you please identify yourself by pressing your call button." A while later, "again, if there are any doctors aboard, please identify yourself to the flight attendants. There is a passenger who is very ill."

Flashbacks to Airplane. I wondered if eggs were coming out her mouth. I kept looking for Leslie Nielsen.

Anyways, they had taken the sick woman to the back of the plane, but the flight attendant right in front of me was on the phone (with a doctor on the ground I think). I could hear her talking about the passenger's symptoms, then running to the back of the plane, then running back to the phone and giving the doctor updates. This kept up for a while, then suddenly, I heard the deafening roar of the engines start to die down. The map screen on my personal entertainment thingy showed that the airplane was slowing down and losing altitude. I opened the shade on the window and saw a huge stream coming off the wing which I initially thought was a contrail, until I realized it was too big and it wasn't coming off the wing tip. I quickly figured they were dumping fuel which meant...

The pilot came over the PA "ladies and gentlemen, I apologize for the inconvenience, but we're making an emergency landing so we can get medical attention for our sick passenger." The pilot and flight attendant later said that in their entire careers, they'd never had to make an unscheduled stop.

For those of you who don't know, when a plane makes an unscheduled landing, it has to dump fuel. This is because the added weight of the fuel puts excess stress on the landing gear. I was able to get a few pictures of the fuel being dumped, but unfortunately, I forgot the USB cable for the camera, so I'll have to wait until I get home to post them.

So, at around 3:00am local time, we landed in Gander, Newfoundland, Canada. Paramedics came and took the woman off the plane. After about 30 minutes to an hour, (after they refueled the plane), we resumed our journey to London. This stop was just enough time to put us into London just as my connection to Manchester was leaving.

So I had to run to the BMI ticket counter in London to reschedule my flight. In the end, I got to Manchester a little after 6:00pm, 10 hours after my scheduled arrival.

Thank goodness I hadn't checked any baggage.