UA905/UA976 Flight Report (and pics)

Hello, I’m back. Most of you probably won’t have noticed that I was gone which is understandable considering I have only been gone for 5 days!

All my photographs below were taken this morning (24th Nov) at New York’s JFK Airport.

UA905 London Heathrow to New York JFK

Flight UA905 was scheduled to depart London Heathrow’s Terminal 3 at 13:30hrs on Tuesday 19th November. This flight was operated by a Boeing 777-200 aircraft (Registration N774UA) and was bound for Los Angeles via New York.

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N774UA taken from Airliners.net

Check-in was quick and easy and whereas I am used to flying charter from London Gatwick, flying on a scheduled flight from Heathrow was much better. There were not check-in desks for each flight. You simply joined a fast-moving queue and all United flights could use any of the desks that were open.

Having read many reviews about United on the CarSurvey.org website, I wasn’t sure what to expect. Many complained about how rude airport staff and cabin crew were and I was about to see for myself what the situation was. A friendly check-in assistant welcomed us and went through the standard security checks before sorting out our seats which had conveniently been pre-assigned. Unfortunately, we were not lucky enough to get window seats this time and around and were seated in row 19.

Heathrow Airport was a quick experience and one I would rather forget. Although flying from Heathrow was more convenient – closer to home, more flights to USA etc, the facilties at Terminal 3 were less than acceptable in my eyes. There was maintenance throughout the building and therefore, there wasn’t as much space available as there would be normally. The so-called “Quiet Seating Area” was disturbed by men drilling and banging the walls. The shops were also not what I had expected. Shops like Bvlgari, Rolex and Harrods – nothing for the every day shopper.

At 12:30, we were called for boarding which was a relief. Our gate was number 19 and this was a 5 to 10 minute walk away. We didn’t actually board until about 30 minutes after arriving at the gate. As we arrived, so did the cabin crew which indicated that a wait was required.

The seating configuration was 2-5-2 in economy and the legroom was far better than I have ever come across in previous years with other airlines. I sat in seat 19D which wasn’t too bad. I didn’t feel uncomfortable and felt that 8 hours wouldn’t kill me!

The aircraft was of an incredible size inside and was new to me, I’ve never flown the 777 before and I was certainly impressed.

We pushed back promptly and taxiied to the runway for an on time departure. Two aircraft waited in front of us and within 5 minutes, it was our turn to take off.

After about 10 minutes, the crew served us with a round of drinks – all of which were included in the price of the ticket and the entertainment began. The 777 had personal TVs on all seats and a radio with a vast selection of music to suit every music-lovers needs.

I noticed on my map on the television that we seemed to be heading east. The aircraft made a very steady turn to the left and headed over the Midlands, continuing it’s climb. We passed out over Liverpool, straight over the top of the Isle of Man and finally over Northern Ireland before we entered the skies above the Atlantic.

A hot lunch was served and the food was of a very high quality, again, beating that of any other airline in the past. We had a choice of pasta Italian style or Chicken. I’m a meaty-man myself so went for the chicken which was very tasty. It was served with potato, gravy, mushrooms in a mushroom sauce and some other vegetables. Also with the meal was a bread roll, half of which was brown and the other half white and some salad. For dessert was a generous portion of Cadbury Dairy Milk ice cream with bits of chocoloate in it. It was good to hear that my mum and sister weren’t going to have any because they were wanting to cut out such greasy foods so I ended up having three pots.

Much drinks rounds and a duty free round later and we were served a snack about 75 minutes before touching down. This was a roll filled with smoked ham and cheddar cheese, a packet of crisps, a Toffee Crisp and some other little goodies.

The aircraft touched down at John F Kennedy about 15 minutes early – just after 16:00hrs local time in New York and we disembarked to find that this airport was also under rennovation. After gathering our cases, passing through immigration and passport control, we went outside to get a taxi and make the trip to our hotel.

UA976 New York JFK to London Heathrow

Our flight was an early one and was scheduled to depart at 08:30hrs on Sunday 24th November and due to arrive at 20:35hrs at London Heathrow. Check-in was available between the hours of 05:30hrs and 07:45hrs and we wanted to get there first to ensure we had seats together.

Terminal 7 at John F Kennedy was great and is mainly used by British Airways, followed by United. About 75% of the check-in desks were all wearing British Airways titles with the remainder in United’s colours.

The trip through check-in was going too smoothly, something had to go wrong.. and it did! My dad was one lucky passenger who had to trek around the airport with his suitcase because it was going to have a random security check. I understand things like this have to be done, but we felt like criminals. The security officers asked him to take a seat and “await clearance” which he done. Seconds later, his case was loaded onto a large trolley and pushed away to be loaded onto the aircraft.

Terminal 7 is also used by America West and Qantas and some other airlines which are clearly not frequent visitors to the airport. Terminal 5 seemed to have no activity and the information board seemed to suggest that no airlines fly from the terminal which I found hard to believe? Terminal 6 was that of JetBlue Airways and their A320s could be seen taxiing around in just about every corner of the airport!

The signs in terminal 7 are all new and part of the rennovations currently being carried out. Some of the signage referred to it as the “British Airways Terminal” and the signage itself was that used by British Airways – a white font on a navy blue background.

Upon entering security, my sister set the metal detector off as she did flying out to the United States and had to endure an embarrassing body search. She was cleared and then found that her vanity case had been pulled aside to be searched, because it was cluttered and the X-Ray machines could not establish what exactly was being carried.

The departure lounge and gates area are all merged as one and the views over the airfield are good.

Our 08:30hrs flight began boarding at 07:35hrs.

The flight was just a non-stop flight from New York to London and had not come from anywhere, nor would it go anywhere after touching down at Heathrow. The aircraft was a Boeing 767-300 (Registration N647UA). Attached below is a photograph taken from Airliners.net with the window which I sat next to, highlighted!

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Again, it was another on time departure and once airborne, we flew out over the Atlantic with an estimated crossing time of just 6 hours which was soon to change due to poor weather and the state of Heathrow.

We were served a snack-type breakfast after takeoff and an hour and a half before landing, the crew started to served a dinner consisting of chicken and gravy etc. After serving perhaps three of four rows, the aircraft was thrown up and down due to high winds and the trolleys had to be stowed away. The seatbelt sign within a period of about 15 minutes, went on and off again three times because the weather was bad, then good, then bad and it was like a game!

Our butter and cheese which were part of the meal had also been stowed away in a hot container and when the meal was eventually served again, our butter had to be poured onto our bread roll and the gravy had gone hard, the rice dried up and stuck to each other and it didn’t look too pleasant, but it tasted fine.

We actually touched down at Heathrow about 50 minutes earlier than scheduled, but the United Airlines website said this about our flight…

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…Arrived at gate 20 minutes early. The reason for the 30 minute variation is that the gate which we arrived at at Heathrow Terminal 3 (number 22) was occupied by an American Airlines 777. This departed late and we arrived early, so we had to sit on what was becoming a very hot and stuffy aircraft for 30 minutes in the dark.

The flights were both great and regardless of what people have said about United, we will certainly fly with them again in the near future.

Photographs

These photographs were taken by me. The quality is poor because I took my webcam instead of using my decent camera. Below each is a description.

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British Airways Concorde can be seen on the right. It departed just a few seconds later.

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2 United 767s at terminal 7 in New York. I was photographing the one on the right, thinking it was our aircraft and then the one one the left appeared – this was ours!

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America West 757 in an interesting colour scheme and a BA 747 which departed for Heathrow just 30 minutes after we did.

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AeroMexico 757 seen from the window as we held on the runway for departure.

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As we lifted off, I took this shot of the shadow of the aircraft passing over another runway.