Traveler Caught In Delays Cashes In With $11K From Delta

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MIAMI (CBSMiami) --  Airlines had to scrub at least 150 flights but Delta Airlines cancelled more than 3,200 over the weekend due to strong storms. For one woman, Delta gave her some major money to for her trouble – $11,000 to be exact.

Hours after the storms moved out from Hartsfield Jackson Airport, people were still camping out on the floor of the second floor atrium - victims of the old domino effect of delay.

"We were going to visit my husband's parents in Aventura. It's right next to Fort Lauderdale," said Laura Begley Bloom whose family made the major bucks from the delays.

Bloom knows how they felt. She was delayed too while traveling on Delta Airlines from New York to Florida with her husband and 4-year-old.

"The flight kept getting delayed and there was a lovely woman at the desk and we just kind of kept begging her, and finally she got a manager to sign off and they signed off on the gift cards," said Bloom.

"And it was kind of a repeat on Saturday. We got to the airport. The flights were delayed and they were already asking for volunteers and I checked in that morning and we said hey if they give us more money, let's do it again and pretty much the exact thing happened," said Bloom. "We walked away with 11 thousand dollars total."

As much as Bloom and her family feel lucky to get all that money, she also feels happy to help the people who really needed to get to their destinations.

"There were so many people at the airport who were heading to weddings, people who were going to funerals, people who were going to see their dying parents, who had real reasons to go.  And of course, we had a reason to go - we wanted to see our family but it wasn't a life or death situation," said Bloom.

Laura Begley Bloom is also a Forbes.com contributor. She wrote about what happened for the magazine. She'll also be a guest on 'CBS This Morning' on Tuesday.