Uber drivers share war stories of Southwest melt-down

As thousands of people were stuck at the San Diego International Airport during and after Christmas because of canceled flights, many people rented cars inside and near the airport and drove to their destinations. One local family drove a rental 1000 miles away. Other travelers hopped on Greyhound busses and trains, and some took Uber or Lyft — as far as Las Vegas.

Cesar Delgadillo, a local Uber and Lyft driver picked up passengers around Christmas at the San Diego airport and drove them to Los Angeles International Airport. From Uber, he said he earned $110 driving the passengers to LAX and drove another passenger for "$50 to return from Oceanside to San Diego." When asked if it was worth the gigs, he responded, "definitely not — worthless." Traffic was at a crawl heading northbound and southbound on the I-5 and the drive time to and from Los Angeles was double and even triple, say holiday drivers online. But after the "worthless" drive to LAX, he made it up when he returned to San Diego on December 26, "Someone was really happy with my delivery today [and gave me a] $100 tip," Delgadillo said.

J.P., another Uber and Lyft driver, got a big tip, a gas fill-up, and a free meal for a 700-mile drive. The mid-city share driver said on NextDoor after Christmas that he had just returned from Las Vegas. "I took two people from San Diego Airport to Vegas. Southwest Airlines had them rescheduled for January 1. I asked what the fare was, and they said $430, but they split it, so $215 each. I got paid $350 as the driver. I'm not sure I made [money] on that 700-mile run since Uber does not allow drivers to pick up out of state to come back, but it was fun."

I spoke to Teri B., an Uber and Lyft driver from San Diego, as she was ready to make her New Year's Eve rounds. She saw her fellow share driver's post about the San Diego to Las Vegas $350 trek. "He said it took about 10 hours, so it worked out to about $35 an hour, and that's really not a bad rate," she said to me. "Overall, just driving around the city, you can expect somewhere between $25 and $35 an hour, and with a long trip like that, you're saving on miles per gallon so that I will take those in a minute."

Teri then hopped onto the Lyft app on her phone to get a price quote on a San Diego to Las Vegas trip. "OK, so Lyft costs $404, and the driver would probably make $325 or so out of that." But California-based share drivers cannot tap into the Las Vegas or Nevada pool of customers, so "you would have to get back across the California state line before you can go online," Teri explained. "And the problem with being that far is that you might get a bunch of short little rides around Barstow." As a result, they'll be reluctant to find a "PAX," a passenger who needs a lift back to San Diego.

So I asked Teri why she didn't post up at the San Diego airport when more than 6000 flights, per Flightaware.com, on December 26-27 were canceled due to poor weather. "There can be upwards of 50 to 100 drivers at any given time, so, 'no thank you,'" Teri said. "Besides, drivers right now are avoiding the airport because of the construction at Terminal 1 because it's tough to get in and out of."

Some people stranded at the airport did not use the Uber and Lyft options, as their destinations were over 1000 miles away from San Diego.

"We decided to rent a car and drive 17 plus hours, 1000 plus miles to Colorado," tweeted Marcella Lee of News 8 San Diego. "The amazing @budget operations manager told me they’d rented out 900 cars by 11 am! He was moving things along as fast as possible. There are no @SouthwestAir flights until Friday."