Southwest cancellations: Carpool back to Wisconsin turned strangers into friends

Bob Mayer, Jeni Summers, and Alex Tick all spent Christmas day in different places. But on Monday, the three Wisconsinites and Tick's wife all ended up in a car together driving from St. Louis to Milwaukee. It all started on Friday. Mayer was making his way back to Wisconsin after a Christmas-themed cruise that launched from Galveston, Texas. He was in line to board his Southwest plane at the airport in Houston when his flight was canceled. He was supposed to fly through Denver, before getting on a plane there to Milwaukee. "I was supposed to get to Milwaukee right around 10 o'clock, 9:30 so I could spend Christmas at home," Mayer said. At the time, he had no idea it was just one of thousands of Southwest flights that would be canceled over the Christmas weekend and the in days to follow. He was originally rebooked for the next day, Christmas Eve. So he took an Uber to a hotel and stayed the night in Houston.