Just wanted to share my experience flying out of the Catania airport to the US.
We were due to take the direct, Catania to JFK, 10 AM flight on Friday, May 8th. Everything was going well, made it to the airport plenty early via the Catania Alibus, checked in, luggage checked through to our home airport. Security was a few minutes of time.
Note that Catania airport is small, and busy, maybe too small for it's volume. The Non-Schengen area is even smaller, servicing flights mainly to the UK, and the once a day Delta JFK flight. When we approached immigration, it was not open, they only open about two hours before a flight, so we had coffee.
Immigration opened up, I told my wife to wait, no sense standing in a long line, we have plenty of time, and ours was about the only flight leaving. Then, they stopped processing people. We waited, no communication as to what was going on, finally someone from the airport mentioned the Delta flight will be delayed, to wait. About 20 minutes later we got a delayed flight message, delayed 8 hours, to 6 PM! We discussed leaving the airport, looked at maybe just rescheduling to the next day, and started to come up with a plan. About that time, we received a cancellation notice on our app.
Now the problem this presented is that there are no other Delta flights leaving that airport, maybe a couple Air France flights, all other flights are Euro-Budget airlines. As I went to reschedule, I received notice that I was rebooked, for two days later (Sunday) on a Catania-Paris (CDG)-MSP- home itinerary (I hate CDG). They then herded everyone down to baggage claim.
There really was no communication from staff at the airport, no reason given for the cancellation, we heard from others a pilot was sick, who knows. People were in a bit of a panic, no one had a rebooked flight out that day. They did direct people to a counter where they would book a hotel and provide transfer, but I had a plan. I really felt a bit sorry for most folks, they were clueless as to what to do, dependent on customer service that was almost non-existent at the airport.
I calmed my wife down, told her that compensation was required, more than we would need, that we just need to take charge. I went on Booking.Com found a nice B&B in Ortigia for two nights, bought bus tickets, and off we went.
We spent a wonderful two days in Ortigia, had some nice meals, relaxed, all on Delta's dime (well, to be reimbursed, received the email about reimbursement of expenses while waiting for the bus). A bad situation turned into an extra two days in Sicily.
A post script: The rebooked itinerary had us taking a flight to CDG, landing at 2:55. Our flight to Minneapolis was to close boarding at 3:35...so 40 minutes to get off the plane, get through exit immigration (the whole EES issue), a transfer to another terminal, and on to our gate. Add to all this, we had seats in the very last row of the plane.
We finally got off the plane, hustled to immigration, that only took a few minutes, onto the waiting shuttle, to the new terminal, onto our gate, where we made it with 20 minutes to spare...really. I almost feel bad about bad mouthing CDG in the past (OK, No, I don't). They even held the plane for a while while other late transfers showed up and the trip home was otherwise uneventful.