Fort Lauderdale airport reopens after days of rain, flooding and stranded passengers

Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport reopened Friday, almost two full days after rising floodwaters shut down the major South Florida economic driver.

The airport resumed operations at 9 a.m. Several flights had departed as of 9:30 a.m. and people were in the terminals ready to go.

At 9:15 a.m., planes began taking off from the runway. The tarmac, however, held ample evidence of the past days’ downpours in the form of large ponds pooled on the concrete surrounding idle aircraft.

Inside the terminal, airport workers prepared for passengers. Flight crews wheeled suitcases down the hallways and service workers opened their kiosks.

And, passengers waited.

Scene at the terminals

Allison Douglas, 34, her 10-year-old daughter, Adrienne Johnson, and Douglas’ best friend and her young son relaxed by the baggage claim knowing they had a long day ahead anticipating their late afternoon flight back to their home in New Jersey by way of Philadelphia International Airport.

Unlike other passengers, they weren’t delayed for days. Their Caribbean cruise had just ended, but they had heard about the airport shutdown and they wanted to arrive early.

“We monitored it because they notified us there was major flooding here and we might be delayed or diverted somewhere else,” Douglas said.

They also wanted to see if there was a possibility to hop on an earlier flight.

“We don’t really know the impact of everybody else’s flights,” Douglas said. “We came early to see if they opened up any additional flights to get us on earlier.”

The Block and Kalinich families from Los Angeles took an adventurous trek to get to Fort Lauderdale on their way to their vacation destination of Havana.

While Monaka Kalinich and her husband flew into Miami and drove to Fort Lauderdale, their friends Michael and Angie Block flew into Sarasota and drove all night in the pouring rain to get to the airport.

“It took us an hour and a half to go 12 miles,” Michael said as the three friends waited in a long Southwest Airlines queue for their flight to Cuba.

And, when they arrived at their hotel off Las Olas Boulevard, flooding was all around, almost costing them their rental car.

“We made one wrong turn and ended up in two and a half to three feet of water,” Michael said.

Airport shut down on Wednesday

Officials had to shut the airport Wednesday. It remained closed all day Thursday as roads into and out of Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport were impassible and runways underwater.

After the deluge grounded flights, some passengers had to weather the downpours inside the airport overnight.

PHOTOS: Floods shut down Fort Lauderdale airport and swamped runways. See what it looked like

Joe Rasgado, 70, of Cooper City, was one of the few non-police officers inside a lonely Terminal 1 on Thursday. He arrived around 4 p.m. Wednesday but was still stuck inside until 6 a.m. Thursday when he was finally able to pick up a rental car. On Thursday afternoon, he came back to the airport to return the rental car.

“I’ve been living here 50 years and this has never happened,” he said about the flooded runway.

Miami Herald reporter Omar Rodriguez Ortiz contributed to this report.