Expedia and Air Tran Pass the buck!

I'd welcome any help that I can get from readers of this forum. I'm
certainly not getting any from Expedia and Air Tran!
I believe firmly that my family was cheated out of a refund of $700 by
Expedia and AirTran. My wife booked a trip through Expedia for our
family on 08/05/2004. The purpose of the trip was to attend my wife's
family's Family Reunion in Cincinnati, an event that occurs no more
frequently than once every ten years.
On 09/04, the day that we were scheduled to leave, all flights from
Orlando and nearly every other major Florida airport were cancelled due
to the impending arrival of Hurricane Frances. Obviously, this event
made it impossible for us to attend the reunion, which was scheduled to
start on the evening of our departure date. My wife contacted both
Expedia and Airtran by phone, and she was told by Air Tran's Customer
Service Department that a full refund would be processed after we
mailed their tickets back to Expedia. We sent the tickets back,
following instructions given us by Expedia.
After waiting for the refund to appear on our credit card bill for over
two months, we called Expedia again, and were told that it would take
approximately 120 days for the refund to be processed.
On 11/09/2004, we received an email from Expedia which stated that the
Air Tran was disputing our claim, and that they would only honor it by
in the form of credit to be used for other flights on that airline
within the next year! After we received this bombshell, we called
Airtran and talked to their Customer Service Supervisor, who informed
us that flights from Orlando did not fall in a region where full
refunds were authorized. She told us that we must have been given false
information when we called initially. What a surprise it was to us, to
find out that, after watching the wreckage caused by a major hurricane,
the homes lost, and the anguish created by the storm, we were also
going to have to pay for flights that we, and no doubt hundreds of
other passengers, could not take! Since then, we've contacted both
Expedia and Air Tran several times, but they've received only "passing
the buck" responses from Expedia, and canned "that's our policy"
responses from Airtran. We've even written personal letters to Mr.Erik
Blachford, the CEO of Expedia, and Mr. Joseph Leonard, the CEO of
Airtran, but they haven't considered our problem serious enough to
follow up with us.
As a contrast to the behavior exhibited by Expedia and Air Tran, my
Father and Mother were in Massachusetts during the same storm to attend
a Class Reunion, having flown there from Orlando to Albany on
Southwest. When they were scheduled to return, and it appeared that
there was a possibility that the Orlando airport would still be closed,
they were contacted by Southwest, who told them that if they wanted to
change their flights, they could do it at no cost, up to flight time,
and that if they just wanted to cancel, they could receive a full
refund. They were also told by another passenger that FAA regulations
required this type of action when an airport was closed and planes were
not allowed to take off or land.
What do you think? In the next few days, assuming that I don't hear
from the CEOs (I'm not holding my breath), I plan to contact a couple
of travel ombudsmen, including Chris Elliott, from National Geographic
Explorer, and the individual from Conde Nast, but I'm looking for
government agencies who might be able to help me resolve the issue. I
could consider suing, of course, but there's a limit on how far you can
go within the legal system without spending a lot more than the cost of
the potential recovery. Thank you in advance for your help.