telstarbox
Established Member
What was your best and worst flight ?
I think my worst was a economy redeye on Virgin America as well, fully booked flight from SFO-EWR about 8-9 years ago. Now, I loved flying VX back then, they were years ahead of the legacy airlines' product, but that's the only domestic overnight I ever did west to east with any airline, and never again! As you say, cramped, red hot and surrounded by agitated children and inconsiderate "adults". The shortness of the flight, five hours, was a curse in terms of sleep but a blessing in terms of simply getting to the end.Worst was Los Angeles to New York with Virgin America. Had travelled from Baltimore to LA by train, so decided to fly back. Big mistake. No leg room, miserable flight attendant, so hot it was stifling, couldn’t wait to get off
My favourite way to fly, or it was. Fortunate to do Heathrow to Cape Town a couple of months before they were effectively withdrawn from service, which was another excellent flight. Remember the pilot introducing the plane as “The Queen of the Skies”, he sounded very proud to be flying the machine, and why not.I loved flying upstairs on BA's 747-400s as well, I always seemed to get a good and attentive crew.
Sounds like something that would not happen these days at all!One flight is seared into the memory.
Mid/late 1980s, September. I was waiting at Boston for the evening BA flight to Gatwick. It was inbound from Philadelphia but late, due to weather. At Boston the leading edge of what was described on the TV as the "worst, earliest winter storm in 100 years" was just arriving. Gale force winds and heavy snow. I asked the gategirls what time the plane was due? "Sorry don't know". So what happens if the flight has to be cancelled? "Captain xxxxx NEVER cancels.......". A comment delivered with hysterical laughter. "Oh ****!" I thought............The destination boards were full of cancelled flights but ours was shown as still going, though time TBA.
Eventually it arrives around 90 minutes late. Little time wasted getting us onboard, while this happens the plane was sprayed with deicer. The aircraft was completely full, the back three or four rows full of black-robed Muslim women intending to fly on from Gatwick to Jordan. The aircraft was an early 747 with P&W engines - faster than the alternatives.
A pneumatic starting trolley was dragged up and an attempt made to start the engines. This proved impossible as the wind was rotating the engines backwards. Two trolleys were tried, then three in series, no success. In the end a hose is run from an adjacent El Al 747 and the engines bump-started from that.
We get the go ahead to go - but 90 minutes has elapsed since deicing and the federal limit is one hour. That gets ignored and we get towed through a foot of snow to the end of the taxiway..............and wait for the snowploughs to clear the runway, its getting scraped before every takeoff. In the back of the aircraft the Muslim women collectively start wailing, praying and chanting - they're convinced we're about to die. Runway cleared, we have to go immediately before too much more snow pitches. So we have what must be one of the fastest take off runs ever, into zero visibility. Behind us the airport gets closed down 30 minutes later. The wheels come up, we're airborne and applause breaks out. For a takeoff, not a landing. Nearly four hours late.
But things haven't finished yet. We get to cruising height - in the jet stream. A fast jet stream, possibly the fastest recorded. If you like fairground rides, great. Otherwise............four hours of sheer hell. Yes just four hours. Those P&W engines plus the wind got us across in four hours, as we came in to land the pilot announced "we've just made the second-fastest subsonic Atlantic crossing" - only an RAF VC10 was quicker. Despite leaving four hours late we arrived close to within 30 minutes of time. We landed to the sound of a cabin full of shocked silence, something never to forget. The Muslim women's onward service was supposed to use the same aircraft - if they'd refused I couldn't have blamed them. All of us were scared, but they were all convinced they were on a one-way trip.
Incidentally on the outward bound trip a few weeks earlier the pilot had routed via Iceland so we could see the aurora - and get a look at an erupting volcano.................safety had a different meaning in those days
Worst would have to be Ryanair Frankfurt-Manchester about 4 years ago. The following things happened:
1) Information not being properly displayed or announced in the terminal building, so there was a huge rush to security immediately before departure (Frankfurt puts security immediately before the gate, unlike British airports which put it immediately after the check-in process). This lead to a long delay.