Doug, 2.5 hrs is not that long of a leg for a 737-400. The 7000 foot long runway for LGA (both rwys are the same length) and given the fact that this was not hapening in a hot and humid summer day, I 'd think that there was more to this story. Can you give us a more information on the stop at RDU? Anybody boarded the plane? Was there a crew change? Maybe there were some limitations on the thrust or the weight due to some mulfunction that didn't affect the aircraft being airworthy. BAHA -----Original Message----- From: The Airline List [mailto:AIRLINE@LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU]On Behalf Of Douglas Kroll Sent: Monday, April 08, 2002 2:35 PM To: AIRLINE@LISTSERV.CUNY.EDU Subject: LGA-NAS USAIRWAYS 1979 question hey all, last week i was fortunate enough to go down to the bahamas on spring break and was on a USAIRWAYS 737-400 from LGA to nassau...the gate agent informed us all that we would be making a fuel stop in raleigh durham because the runways at LGA weren't long enough for the plane to take off with the amount of fuel that was needed..supposedly the headwinds were very strong that day..i just thought it was weird to have a fuel stop on a scheduled 2.5 hour flight to the carribean..i was wondering if anyone had ever heard of this before...thanks guys doug kroll