Riding the Mad Dog!! MAN-CPH-MAN

Reason for trip?

This was another trip really just for the love of it all. Having transited through Copenhagen a few times in the past, and quite fancying an actual visit into the city for a (very brief) look around, I convinced myself a trip was in order. I did consider burning some miles for the hop across the North Sea, but being quite flexible with the date to travel I got a return ticket for £114.
Another reason for this being a desirable route for me was getting to fly the MD-80 series again!!!! Time is not on the side of these ageing beauties, and I want to get my fill of flying this type. I’m not too sure on how long SK plan keep this equipment in service, but I will sure miss them when there gone.

Monday 18th March:

I awoke to a beautiful clear morning at around 6am. Perfect. I quickly got my things together, had a bite to eat and headed out to the car. Over the years, flying has become quite a regular thing for me, but I still get the butterfly’s in my stomach and the big grin on my face every time im on the way to the Airport.
The motorway network was coping well and a quick 45mins got me to MAN. A bit early for check in, so I had a look around T1 to see how the changes are progressing. Quite a difference since I was last in this terminal about 5months prior. Although I couldn’t help but notice the ever growing queue for Security I would soon have to negotiate!!!
I headed back up to check in and it was open. Nobody was waiting so I was checked in and on my way in no time whatsoever. Right…….where does this flippin queue end?? It snaked all over the place and half way up the new T1-T3 link. Ah well I thought….This is all part of the process in this day and age. A few of us in the line up soon got chatting, this passed the time on quite well, and the line was moving at a good speed too. 10mins later (can’t complain about that) I was stripping off ready pass through the approaching checkpoint. No alarms today so I put my belt back on and headed up to the Bolin Lounge.
This Lounge offers some quite good views out across the T1-T3 ramp area, so I just got some breakfast and sat and watched the action.

View out across the ramp

Eastern Airways J41 disconnecting from the tug

After watching the world go by for a good couple of hours, and nearly eating my own body weight in bananas I decided to stroll down to the gate about a half hour before departure. Gate 24 today. The queue was just starting to form as they had just called for boarding. A quick glance out of the window revealed OY-KHG a MD-82. Quality!!! I headed off down the air bridge and took my seat 11A for this short blast across the North Sea.

I love the seats on the SAS Mad Dogs. They are really comfy and the leg room is more than enough for the short runs they are utilised on. In fact I recall a friend who accompanied me on a trip to Japan a while back saying, “He would have preferred to have had the seat off the SAS MD-80 for the entire flight to Japan” instead of the seat we had on one of there A340s after connecting in Copenhagen.

Leg room shot.

After a short wait the Captain introduced himself, his F/O and his Cabin Crew. He also stated that we would be around half an hour late departing as there were slot restrictions in place. About 5mins after having said that we were being pushed back, so he must have got a lucky break and sneaked us in somewhere.
A quick glace around the cabin showed a load of maybe 90% on this flight. None in J and just 4 in Y Extra.
I was sat a bit too far forward to get the full effect of those awesome sounding JT8Ds firing up. Seat 11A is too quiet for my likening.

We taxied out for a departure off 05L following a BMI E145, behind us was a Fly Be E145. After the BMI rotated we crept onto the active runway, and once lined up, the pilot in command opened the taps and we shot off down the runway. The rate of climb seemed incredible up to about 5,000 ft, and then we eased off to a shallower rate as we made a left turn over Audenshaw reservoir. We routed North Easterly up to the Newcastle area, before turning East out over the North Sea.

Climbing out from Manchester

The cabin crew started there buy on board snack service after the fasten seatbelt sign was switched off. I decided not to bother with any items off the trolley on this occasion. The crew seemed friendly enough on this flight, and offered refills to those who had taken Tea or coffee. The ride was super smooth up here today, and well broken cloud offered good views as we hit the Danish coast just South of Ringkobing Fjord.

Ringkobing Fjord in the Jutland county of Denmark

Not long after landfall, we hit our top of decent and made our way slowly down for an approach onto 04L.

Snow had reportedly caused some disruption in the area the night before, and delays were encountered at CPH for some evening flights. Having said that there seemed to be little evidence of much snow remaining until we made a hardly noticeable touchdown, where some snow banks had been formed off the side of the taxiways by the ploughs.

On stand and with engines shut down, a mad dash to disembark began. I just sat it out and was probably one of the last off the plane. On leaving I thanked the crew and made my way for the train into Copenhagen City Centre. Firstly though I had to get my usual snack from this airports “Seven Eleven” store…… Chicken Stix! They are so tasty. Like a Chicken Kebab I guess.

My time in Copenhagen was very limited, and with no pictures I won’t go into detail, other than to say it seems a really nice place, with some cool looking bars that would be great to sit outside and have a few beers in summer. Also the Chicks are HOT as is the case with most of Scandinavia. 😉

The Return Flight:

The Train took me back to CPH with about an hour and a half remaining until departure, so I just headed straight up to security to get through as soon as possible. A few small rows of queues had built up, but nothing on the scale of Manchester earlier in the day. After I was airside, I just passed the time looking around the shops and got a coffee to wait out the time.

After the departure gate was announced (can’t recall what number) I headed down to find it would be OY-KHE taking us back to Manchester this evening another MD-82 In full Star Alliance livery. Unfortunately I could not get a decent angle to get a picture for you.

We boarded on time and took my seat for this flight 14A. One of the last passengers to board came and sat next to me. Ah well. Though the legroom is good it would have been great to stretch out a bit more. Takeoff was on 04R, and again we climbed like a rocket, banking round to the left to put us on a Westerly heading.

This flight was fairly uneventful. I did decide to try an overpriced buy on board sandwich and it was rubbish. In comparison to say LHs sandwiches which are free, and quite satisfying, this was just bad food.

Cloud cover was more substantial on the return leg, but i guess we followed a very similar route as the outbound flight at FL340. After entering the hold at ROSUN for one circuit SK541 broke out of the cloud base to make an approach onto 05R followed by a taxi into gate 24 where i left earlier.

SAS are under pressure to cut costs drastically. In doing so they offer little more than a low cost carrier now. With so much infighting between staff from Norway, Sweden and Denmark and problems with the Unions, a once great airline seems to be falling apart at the seams. I can’t really complain too much. I got a good fair for the return trip, but there just seems to bit a bit of a spark missing somewhere.

Overall this was a good trip though, and hey! It’s always good to ride the Mad Dog.
I will leave you with some pictures from the decent into Manchester, as the sun was setting for another day

Thanks for reading
Lee

Into the ROSUN hold for one circuit