Is a 1hr 3min layover at ORD (Chicago) enough when coming in international?
- By
- Aparna Patel
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- 4 Aug, 2023
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You will be fine. It might be that you are on a different flight if delayed, but you will get to your destination.
I have even arrived accidentally at ORD for a flight that was booked out of OHR. The woman at the United counter simply laughed and switched me to fly out of ORD at no extra charge. The United staff there will take good care of you.
For a normal international flight, the answer would be a clear “not a chance”.
However, your flight is different. Most flights from Canada (including yours) go through US immigration and customs in Canada, so functionally you are arriving on a US domestic flight. The gates you’ve mentioned confirm this – if it was a true international arrival it would land in Terminal 5, however the gates you’ve stated are in Terminal 2 (you may also land/depart from Terminal 1, however 1 and 2 are directly connected so they are basically one terminal).
So your question now becomes is ~1 hour enough for a Domestic United to United connection at Chicago, and the answer is a solid “probably”. Normally. It’s a connection that in most cases you would make, and if you don’t because it’s on one ticket then the airline will be responsible for rebooking you on another later flight.
I say “normally” because your flight is tomorrow. And tomorrow isn’t going to be “Normal”. Chicago is expecting bad weather, which will most likely play hell with flights, and you can expect multiple delays and “normal” may not apply.
As a result of this weather, United Airlines has a “weather waiver” active for tomorrow, which means that if you want to change your flights – either to a different routing to avoid Chicago (if one exists) or to different flights and/or a different day then you can do so free of charge.
Credit:stackoverflow.com‘