Your last plane journey

[orudge]

Well, we have a thread for trains, why not for planes?

Trip: MSP - SFO (Minneapolis/St Paul - San Francisco)
Airline: United Airlines
Flight No: UA817
Date: 2nd January 2010
Aircraft: Airbus A319
Seat: 6C (*the* most spacious row on the plane, more legroom than first class )
Delayed: by about half an hour due to it being bloody cold in Minneapolis

then...

Trip: SFO - RNO (San Francisco - Reno)
Airline: United Airlines (operated by SkyWest Airlines)
Flight No: UA6828
Date: 2nd January 2010
Aircraft: Bombardier CRJ-200
Seat: 3D (alas, not so spacious... a very small and cramped plane)
Delayed: by about half an hour too, which in the end proved to be quite handy as I didn't miss the flight due to the first delay!

Anybody else been anywhere exciting?

[EXTspotter]

Trip: Amsterdam (AMS) - Exeter (EXT)
Airline: Flybe
Flight No: BE1534
Date: 15th Nov 2009
Aircraft: Bombardier Dash 8-Q400
Reg: G-JECE "The Wembley Grecians"
Seat: 21B (Aisle)

Just a quick hop back from Amsterdam, got scanned by the whole body scanner, but it took ages and the lines were huge, all UK flights leave from a special area which has much more stringent security, at the same time as our departure was an A319, so the queues were massive seeing as departure gate is only given about 20 minutes before departure, yet the scanner kept breaking down and there was only one normal security line, so both flights were delayed for a little while waiting for passengers.

Some of my previous flights were more interesting, the most being the seaplane between Male and the island we were staying on in the Maldives.

[andel]

From: Desk
to: Success
Flying by: seat of my pants

Overall rating: 8/10 but best to wear the dark trousers just in case.

[audigex]

I've never been on a plane in my 20 years - am I weird?

I hit a speed bump at a fair whack last week though, so:

Trip: My house to Town
Airline: Jon's brother's corsa
Flight No: AA0001
Date: 28th December 2009 etc
Aircraft: Vauxhall Corsa CDTi 1.3l
Seat: Driver's
Delayed: about 30 seconds while I checked the front suspension

[61653]

From: Munich
To: Manchester
Via: Dusseldorf
Airline: British Airways/Deutsche BA
Plane: Think they were both some sort of Boeing 737, but i'm no expert.
Date: A long time ago- Feb 1997. Returning from a week-long school exchange in Austria (onward travel to/from Munich to Kirchdorf-An-Der-Krems was by a hired Mondeo Estate, as there were only 3 other students and 1 teacher on the trip).

[Niek]

From: Amsterdam
To: Innsbruck
Airline: Transavia
Plane: Boeing 737-700
Seat: 6B
Delay: About 30 to 40 minutes; crew arrived too late and had to de-ice

[PikkaBird]

17th of December 2009:

RJOK -> RJTT
Airline: ANA
Boeing 767, sitting somewhere in the middle. Nice enough flight, ANA economy is the best economy I've ever flown.

Bus ride across Tokyo, then;

RJAA -> KSFO
Airline: ANA
Boeing 777, sitting right at the back. Makes for a bumpier ride, but the seats are only 2 across in the last two rows so we don't have to sit next to a stranger and don't have anyone kicking the back of our seats.

Longggggggg flight, but good movie/tv selection on the seatback. Go ANA.

KSFO -> KLAS
Airline: United
Delayed by 2 hours for 'operational reasons', no-one bothered telling us, no-one at the desk and there were a lot of confused passengers. Very crappy old 757 when it finally showed up. Welcome to the USA. The pilot made a nice hands-on circuit landing into Vegas though.

United had better not screw up on the flight back next week because our connection at KSFO is very tight.

[Rubidium]

Oh... Haneda -> Narita. You know there run some direct trains between both airports? Although most of the time you'll have to transfer once. In Tokyo I had a hotel near the line between both airports, so it was a connection to either airport at walking distance.

Anyway, my last flight was on 21-03-2008 (Good Friday):
Narita-Amsterdam
Airline: JAL
Boeing 767, "sitting" somewhere in the middle. I've got my boarding pass, but the aircraft was so incredibly empty (say 3-5 free seats per passenger) that we were allowed to chose. So I was laying over 3 seats somewhere in the middle of economy watching movies. Never had a more comfortable trip than that one. I loved the personal service during this trip too; they came to ask what I wanted to eat, then walked to the kitchen, got the food and came back. Apparantly it was more work to get out the trolley than to walk up and down the plane a few times.

Although my trip to Japan was quite good too; ~1.5 seats per passenger, so one seat to sit in and one seat to share to store some stuff during the flight. That makes it quite comfortable too.

[PikkaBird]

Oh... Haneda -> Narita. You know there run some direct trains between both airports? Although most of the time you'll have to transfer once.

Yep, our bus was a direct airport limousine service between the two, no transferring or stopping.

Although my trip to Japan was quite good too; ~1.5 seats per passenger, so one seat to sit in and one seat to share to store some stuff during the flight. That makes it quite comfortable too.

I didn't get my booked seat on my last flight from Australia to Osaka, but I ended up with a window-aisle to myself, so I didn't complain too much.

[ostlandr]

Back in August 2009, I made a trip on Southwest Airlines from Albany, NY to Little Rock, AR, changing planes at Baltimore-Washington International (BWI.) My first airline trip, actually. The leg from ALB-BWI was rough- lots of turbulence, to the point I started worrying about things like fatigue cycles on the airframe, etc. BWI-LIT was uneventful. After a great week in Arkansas as camera crew for "damsel in distress" videos, I headed back home.
The flight from LIT-BWI was delayed on the ground for half an hour or so due to congestion at BWI. When a flight is late, the Southwest crews are allowed to be entertainingly silly about the pre-flight briefings, which helps. As soon as we got clearance to take off, the pilot firewalled the throttles and didn't let up until we started our descent into BWI. That was a fast ride, based on the pitch and volume of the engine noise and the wind noise around the fuselage. We got into BWI late, but I had given myself a longer layover rather than make a tight connection. Coming up the coast from BWI to ALB at night was beautiful- was fun picking out landmarks like the Tappan Zee Bridge, etc., and trying to make my mental map of the Albany area match the overhead view. Was really glad to see my wife & daughter waiting at the terminal.

[beeb375]

Trip: LHR - NCL (London Heathrow - Newcastle)
Airline: British Airways
Flight No: BA 1336
Date: 20th January 2010
Aircraft: Airbus A321
Seat: 11F

A short hop for businessy business. NCL-LHR was delayed 90 minutes on the ground at NCL due to fog at LHR, and we still ended up circling for 20 minutes

No trouble on the way back though. "Ladies and gentlemen, we will shortly be dimming the cabin lights, this will make the flight crew look more attractive..."

[orudge]

No trouble on the way back though. "Ladies and gentlemen, we will shortly be dimming the cabin lights, this will make the flight crew look more attractive..."

Heh, I had that same line, and indeed a variety of other comical lines, from a somewhat camp flight attendant on a United flight from Chicago to Minneapolis at about half nine in the evening earlier in the month! Also had a fun line on the SFO - RNO flight I mentioned in my first post here: "Please take care when opening the overhead luggage compartments, as during the flight, shift happens."

Now, my last flights...

Trip: MSP - ORD (Minneapolis/St Paul - Chicago)
Airline: United Airlines
Flight No: UA7696
Date: 21st January 2010
Aircraft: Embraer 170
Seat: 7A (first row of Economy)
Delayed: don't think it was

A brief walk down about 3 gates, then about half an hour or so, to board:

Trip: ORD - LHR (Chicago - London Heathrow)
Airline: United Airlines
Flight No: UA928
Date: 21st January 2010
Aircraft: Boeing 767-300
Seat: 28J (an aisle seat, although the neighbouring window seat was also free. This is the last row of Economy Plus, but I only had an Economy ticket - however, due to the way the planes are laid out, the web site let me pick this seat despite not having paid for the upgrade - score )
Delayed: we had to circle London a bit before landing, but we weren't really 'delayed' as we'd headed over the ocean a bit more quickly than planned

Then a long, long, long walk from the gate we arrived at, which I think was actually at Gatwick Airport, through passport control (where I took a wrong turn and ended up in baggage claim, not for the first time either). Then back through security again, and a few hours in the Diamond Club lounge before boarding...

Trip: LHR - MAN (London Heathrow - Manchester)
Airline: bmi
Flight No: BD588
Date: 22nd January 2010
Aircraft: Airbus A319
Seat: 3A (my normal seat on this flight, 2A, was taken )
Delayed: by about half an hour taking off, due to Heathrow still being too busy
Luggage: wasn't put on the plane for some reason. Most annoying. Turned up the next day though via courier.

[Chrill]

Trip: ARN - EFL (Stockholm-Arlanda Airport to Kefalonia Airport)
Airline: SAS
Flight No: No idea
Date: 20 June 2009
Aircraft: McDonnell Douglas MD-82
Seat: No idea
Delayed: None

Return flight...

Trip: EFL - ARN (Kefalonia Airport to Stockholm-Arlanda Airport)
Airline: SAS
Flight No: No idea
Date: 4 July 2009
Aircraft: McDonnell Douglas MD-82
Seat: No idea
Delayed: Two hours cus of airplane issues on the way to Kefalonia

[EXTspotter]

Wewt I got Exeter - Manchester - Exeter and Stansted - Bilbao - Stansted coming up in next month

[Wasila]

Due to financial issues my last plane journey was in 2006 - prior to that I had gone numerous times a year.

I believe that 2007 began while I was flying over the Atlantic Ocean; I was flying from Phoenix, Arizona to London. Details are shady but as far as I can remember it was BA to Heathrow.

[Geo Ghost]

Alta To Heathrow via Oslo Gardermoen (Returning journey)

IATA: ALF - TOS - OSL - LHR
ICAO: ENAT - ENTC - ENGM - EGLL
Airline: Scandinavian Airlines (Norway)
Flight No: SK4409 / SK809
Date: 18th August 2009
Aircraft: Boeing 737-600 & Boeing 737-800 (w)

A very early start. 7:35 departure time. Got to the airport just in time before the gate was ready to open (Lucky Alta is a small airport )
Stopped in Tromso to pick-up more people, refuel and stock-up on supplies (aka, food ). We even got a free warm breakfast which I didn't expect. unfortunately I was feeling a little sick from lack of sleep and rushing to the airport so I chose not to eat.
Had about 5 hours to wait at Oslo Gardermoen so I went for a walk around the airport and took some pictures... and did a bit of spotting Was quite amazing how close you could get to the planes there. http://www.safirphoto.com/albums/Resize ... R6-062.JPG
Very relaxed trip back and then met my mate who was picking me up at Heathrow. Had a chat and a bit of a laugh and then promptly got stuck in the car-park for about 45 minutes. Good old Heathrow ay?

[vear]

I've never actually flown and I still cannot see any real opportunity to change it

[Nawdic]

Dest: Gatwick - Budapest Ferhigy
Carrier: Easyjet
Plane: Airbus A319
Date May '06
Seat: Next to the wing
Delayed: 5 mins due to traffic

And the same returning to LGW.
And its the only plane ive been on.

[EXTspotter]

Trip: London Stanted (STN) - Bilbao (BIO)
Airline: Easyjet
Flight No: EZY3473
Date: 13/02/10
Aircraft: Airbus A319
Reg: G-EZAL
Seat: 23F (Window)

20 minutes late out of Stansted, but the arrival into Bilbao was sooooooo pretty over the nice snowy mountains. My view of avoiding coach travel as far as possible was again justified thanks to National Express.

[EXTspotter]

Trip: Bilbao (BIO) - London Stanted (STN)
Airline: Easyjet
Flight No: EZY3474
Date: 20/02/10
Aircraft: Airbus A319
Reg: G-EZFM
Seat: 25A (Window)

Departed ontime and arrived at STN 20 minutes early. Also as FM was only delivered 3 months ago, it had the new interior with new seats. Flight was good, but my suitcase was stolen on the train coming back to Newton Abbot because I fell asleep and didn't check on it, therefore my own fault, so frustrated at myself.