Arizona State’s trip to Orlando hit a snag before the Sun Devils ever got off the ground.
The team’s charter flight was delayed Friday because of the nationwide FAA ground stoppage at airports across the country, according to multiple outlets. Via ABC News, the Federal Aviation Administration ordered a nationwide ground stop for all airlines “due to extraordinary circumstances and for reasons of safety.”
ASU had been set to depart around 3:30 p.m. MST and arrive in Florida at 9:30 p.m.
EST after a four-to-five-hour flight. Instead, the schedule was pushed back along with the rest of the country’s air traffic, and there is a solid chance the Sun Devils do not leave until around 9 p.m. local time at the earliest.
That would put their arrival in the early morning.
Arizona State is one of several college football teams caught up in the stoppage, with the Nov. 14 slate now in jeopardy.
“There’s numerous college football teams that have yet to fly to their destinations,” ESPN’s Pete Thamel said. “If this continues, it could significantly impact college football tomorrow.”
Kenny Dillingham was asked earlier this week about how Arizona State handles travel for the UCF game, and he said the program tries to keep its routine intact.
“We’re keeping everything the same about the travel. When you’re going across the country.
Pretty much, we just get there way later. So we leave at two, we get in at 8:30.
But we’re gonna pretty much stay in our own time zone. So, we’ll bed check at 11, 11:30 sometimes, which is 9:30, 10 here, and then we’ll wake them up at 10 o’clock their time.
So we’ll try not to adjust.”
“When you land and it’s dark, and you go to a hotel, you don’t know what time it is, so you may as well just act like it’s eight. So we’re not doing much adjustment of body clocks. We’re just kind of rolling in and out.”
“We (usually) practice in the morning. So anytime you’re a morning team, West Coast going east, the earliest you can kick off is at nine, and we practice at nine.
So the 9 am. is real, just because you got to wake up at 530 and be ready. But if it’s not a 9 am. kickoff, our time, It’s 11 o’clock (kickoff vs.
UCF), waking up at seven. That’s not the end of the world.”
For now, the “in and out” part of that plan has been interrupted at the “in” stage. The delay could create a major headache for Arizona State in a game that matters plenty in Orlando.
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