Cancelled first leg of my flight to Rome.

First of all Alitalia can't cancel a flight from SAN to LAX because Alitalia doesn't fly from SAN to LAX.

Only Delta, United and American Airlines fly between SAN and LAX, therefore it is likely that the flight that was canceled was a Delta flight (Delta and Alitalia are partners).

How did you purchase the tickets? Through Alitalia or Delta? Or through a travel agent (live or online)? You should go through the entity you purchased from.

Your ticket ought to be considered a contract. Who ever sold you the ticket is obligated to get you from point A to point C "acts of god" aside. As Roberto suggests, contact the agency that sold you the ticket and have them rebook your SAN to LAX if they haven't done so already.

Yup, Roberto you are correct. Delta was servicing the flight from SAN to LAX. What threw me off was that it says the flight is Alitalia, but serviced by Delta.

The tickets were purchased through USAA Travel. I called them last week, told them the situation. They contacted Alitalia (wrongly so) and they told USAA Travel that the only way to fix this was to cancel the flight and book a new one.

So obviously I need to put the screws to USAA Travel.

I understand. But be nice to those USAA guys and gals. Usually, they take good care of us old soldiers.

As you found out joerockt, Roberto Is always correct. We all know that.

I know it is not possible for everyone to do, but this is exactly the reason I book my own air directly with the airline. I really fear this kind of thing happening and then trying to find the third party to fix the mess. If everyone was like me these travel sites would be out of business. So glad that there are people on this forum that can sort the whole thing out for you. This was a pretty confusing situation.

Well, luckily for me, USAA is a large, customer orientated organization, so I shouldn't have an issue getting this resolved.

Yes that is a good thing! You should be happily on your trip.