Winter storm strands JetBlue passengers at JFK Airport: 'Just a nightmare'

Several JetBlue Airways passengers were left stranded for several hours this weekend at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport after the carrier faced operational issues due to a winter storm, leaving some planes stuck on the tarmac for hours.  

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One of the passengers was Rob Gould. 

Gould departed from Costa Rica and landed in New York just after midnight Sunday. He was trying to get to Boston, but his first flight to New York was delayed for four hours, Gould told FOX Business. When he finally arrived in New York, he says they had to sit for two hours because "there was no one to get us off the plane."   

Meanwhile, while they were waiting to deplane, Gould says there was an "uproar" with customers refusing to wear face masks, which "was very scary." However, throughout the process, Gould commended the crew, saying they couldn't have done a better job at handling the chaos.  

After waiting two hours for his luggage and booking a hotel Monday to rest for a few hours, he paid out of pocket for a seat on a Delta flight early Monday evening. 

Meanwhile, another passenger, Andy Ayoub, was trying to fly from JFK to Orlando on Sunday afternoon when his flight was delayed eight times. Ayoub's flight was supposed to depart around 2:30 p.m. in New York. Instead, the flight didn't board until six hours later. When they finally took their seats just before 9 p.m., they sat on the tarmac for over an hour, he said. 

Ayoub told FOX Business that the whole situation was "just a nightmare." 

"We were left in the dark and we were being told different things the entire time while waiting," he said.

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Ayoub and Gould weren't alone, according to an aviation industry expert. 

Jason Rabinowitz tweeted Sunday that "nearly 20 inbound flights scattered around the taxiways unable to reach a gate, some of them for several hours." 

He also claimed that at least half a dozen flights were diverting to New Jersey's Newark Liberty International Airport. 

Other passengers also took to Twitter to air their frustrations, with some taking images and videos of the crowds of JetBlue customers in the New York airport. 

JetBlue told FOX Business that its flight schedule was disrupted by the heavy snow and freezing temperatures in the Northeast over the weekend, impacting operations at its two largest markets, New York and Boston.

A spokesperson for JetBlue said the carrier made "good progress in ramping up operations in Boston, LaGuardia and Newark." 

"At JFK, we started operations on Saturday as planned but faced a number of conditions that have slowed the operation down," the spokesperson said. 

To help, the company said it has "combined some flights today to ease those constraints and are working to rebook customers," adding that it "normally takes a few days to fully recover when a storm of this size significantly impacts our two largest markets."

However, customers have also reported having issues getting in contact with customer service. 

Gould said he waited upward of five to six hours to get in contact with the airline on Monday.