Originally posted by A330Crazy
Though yes I did find the seating arrangement quite crampped

I think cramped seating arrangements is typical of most charter airlines and I do not believe they take the comfort of their passengers into consideration when putting the seats onto an aircraft – I think with DVT risks in recent years, charters should be forced to remove rows to allow for extra leg room.

Back to the A330 topic.

I have flown the Airtours A330 as some of you will know. I flew to Montego Bay, Jamaica from London Gatwick (G-MLJL), a flight which lasted 5 minutes off of being 10 hours – that’s right, 9h 55mins! 😀

I loved everything about the aircraft apart from the legroom. Your own personal TV, two cameras outside the aircraft which could be viewed on your TV, toilets beneath the passenger cabin and more.

I’ve only flown JMC once in my life and that was in 2000, in the pre-A330 days when the DC-10-30s had to fly the long haul routes. I found their crew to be quite rude and full of useless ideas. I mentioned a headphone incident in my flight report where the headphone socket wasn’t working. One of the stewardesses suggested my mother and I took turns in using her socket. We couldn’t both listen to the entertainment at the same time – no apology, nothing!

I liked the Airtours aircraft and crew, they were both brilliant and constantly had a smile on their face for the long haul flight across the pond. Nothing was too much for them.

I think there are two sides to every argument – yes, it seems a little extreme to offload three passengers because of a mischievous child, but to refuse travel on a later flight is crazy!

I thought that the Cabin Crew had to ensure the passengers were seated before the aircraft even pushed back from it’s stand, so trying to solve the problem at the last possible minute as they taxi to the runway isn’t going to work!

I can almost feel the tension though – three cabin crew and a toddler not strapped in for takeoff which is getting ever closer. When I returned from New York in November with my family, my sister had a bad stomach and had to go to the toilet minutes before landing. The seatbelt sign had just “pinged” on and she was nowhere to be seen. The aircraft was making quite steeps turns as it neared Heathrow. Finally, she emerged from the loo 3 or 4 minutes from landing and the stressed crew suddenly looked relieved.

It was in 1971 that Northwest started to fly the McDonnell Douglas DC10 series.

They have operated 11 DC10-30s and 21 DC10-40s, but I’m not sure how many have now been withdrawn from service.

The replacement for the DC10 is the 757-300.

I think this sounds promising.

Linking it to Kabir’s low cost topic and what I said in that, I think this airline has played the game properly. Although they are flying from Luton, they are not flying easyJet’s routes and still stick to major destinations.

I think that amongts youngsters, how cool you are all depends on your model of phone.

A brick is a chunky phone that doesn’t fit into your pocket, the sort that at one stage in life, was super-cool. You are a cool dude(!!) if you have a tiny phone with a colour screen and a built in camera.

But as long as it does the job, then why change? I have a Samsung T100 on contract, so the handset was only £25 and I pay £15 a month but get 12 hours of calls. I’d never even consider forking out £450.00 on a mobile and definitely not a Nokia. Their phones change far too frequently for my liking!

The British Climate is a strange one.. warm-ish summers and often very cold, wet winters.

Regardless of the season though, there’s always rain and it’s always nice to escape the dreadful weather for just a week or two.

However, when it gets hot, it’s nice. I’ve not had a holiday in my own country since 1996, but when the sun shines and their isn’t a cloud in sight, Britain can be wonderful.

At the Farnborough Air Show last year, I remember the sun and blue sky and temperatures nearly reaching 30 degrees (27 or 28).

When you go abroad from the UK, you are almost guaranteed wonderful weather. In this country, you cannot even rely on the likes of Michael Fish to guarantee good weather.

Plus.. our sea is F R E E Z I N G all year round!

There are too many low cost carriers in Europe especially and I think it’s obvious that less than half of these will actually make it big – like easyJet.

I think any low cost carrier being set up now is taking a huge risk. There is a lot which could be lost financially, competing with the largest low cost airlines in my opinion – Ryanair and easyJet.

However, airlines such as Jet2 do stand a chance as far as I’m concerned. Operating from Leeds Bradford, not a major airport (if at all) for low cost flights.

Mama Air was all ready to go then flopped, taking a turn for the worst with the project never taking off! Perhaps their choice of hub was never the best anyway.

Too many low cost carriers, regardless of where in the world it is, is a crazy idea. The smaller airlines will just be forced to cease operations after a while because they cannot compete with the long-established and more well-known airlines.