RE: Holiday Airlines – Is their service up to scratch?

LAST EDITED ON 12-Jan-01 AT 11:59 PM (GMT)[p]Well personally, most of the Airlines that I have flown on have been top notch. I fly at least 3 times per year and have done so since being a kid. I went with Air Scandic to Ibiza in October as our Britannia 767 went tech’ and I thought that they were a bit poor; the food was a bit lame and the pilot didn’t say a thing over the intercom. Mind you, I find airline food to be of quite good quality when I fly places. I think though, that first impressions last. People used to say Dan-Air were rubbish (remember them?) but every time I flew with them, I thought they were great. The crew were really friendly and I usually used to get a look in the cockpit on each flight when I was a kid. I remember once, we were flying over the South of France towards Almeria in a 727 in 1987 and the pilot was explaining the INS and all the ‘gubbins’ to me. He was really informative and genuinely relished telling me about his aircraft. In fact I thought the flight were the best bits of the holidays!!! I even remember his name -Capt Andy Pankhurst- Now that’s good service I think. What do other people remember about Dan-Air? Good? Bad? Indifferent? Thanks, Paul.

RE: What engines will the A380 use??

Good point about the wheels e.t.c. Kabir, in the sense that this was actually one of the main engineering problems when designing the aircraft. One of these was the problem of how the many wheels that are required to share the load would fit into the (outsize) undercarriage bay. Another was that an aicraft (beleive it or not) generates a great deal of it’s noise on landing, not from the engines, but from the drag from the flaps and undercarriage e.t.c. It was thought that this would have exceeded European/worldwide noise regulations, but I presume that the problem has now been sorted out. Any further information about this anyone???

Paul.

RE: Ugliest Aircraft?

LAST EDITED ON 05-Jan-01 AT 08:03 PM (GMT)[p]Well, I agree with Kabir. I don’t think that any aircraft can be considered ugly. Workmanlike (?) perhaps, but not ugly. I do think though, that modern computer/man designed aircraft can be quite bland compared to more or less 100% human designed aircraft of the 50’s to the 70’s. I think that the Tristar is a beautiful machine too, although the DH Trident does it for me as it is an example of Great British engineering at it’s best (BAC 1-11 included in that too!) Also, the Sud Aviation Caravelle is a beauty too. I think that the problem today is that aircraft are not designed by people who love creating such machines and who ultimately love aircraft; instead they are designed by white collar conservatives who are obsessed with fuel economy, hush kits, statistics and the like, and who have never been out to an air display or on the Hangar floor. Naturally this is the way forward as money and economy make the world go round, but to me, I would like nothing better than to see and hear 3 Rolly Royce Speys roaring smokily down the runway or four water injected P & W J-58’s (is that the right spec for a 707? apologies if not)screaming over my head!!! Fuel economy and noise regulations suck! Whaddayathink guys???

RE: Would you…….?

LAST EDITED ON 05-Jan-01 AT 07:39 PM (GMT)[p].

RE: How is Turkish Airlines ?

LAST EDITED ON 02-Jan-01 AT 10:22 PM (GMT)[p]Well I used to work as a travel consultant and I used to avoid selling them as the flights never seemed to connect. It was either a night (or two) in Istanbul airport (they don’t provide courtesy accomodation) or nothing! I’ve never flown with them, but they seem to have a fairly modern fleet of aircraft, including RJ-85’S, one of which I saw once displayed at Woodford Airshow in the mid 1990’s. Quite an impressive performance!

Paul.