AC_A340-500
10-11-2005, 10:22 PM
<b>Lightning strike, smoking on the plane, and knives on board. A synopsis.</b>
..........
Here's a quick synopsis of the flight segments on my two day trip to <b>Granada, Spain</b>. Sorry if it's not quite as structured as it could have been.
I fly quite regularly. Without getting too much into detail about why I fly to where I do, I usually fly to a destination and return the next day. When I fly, it's mostly on business. Often charter flights. I usually fly out of FRA, CGN, or MUC and fly within Europe. Usually into busy airports, sometimes into "obscure" airports. Usually the flights are quite uneventful. Not worth writing about. But I decided to share the past 24 hours with you, at least the airbourne parts, cause several "unique" things occured. Things that I found rather interesting.
I arrived at Germany's <b>Cologne</b> airport early. We were not due to depart till 10:20 Monday morning, with check in opening at 9:20 AM. I was early, cause this time of year is fog-time in Germany, which can really slow you down, especially if you have to travel 180 km to get to the airport. I checked in, and went through security. We finally boarded the plane, late. I don't remember exactly how late cause at the time, I didn't think that I'd be writing about it. Anyhow, I figure the flight was about 45 mintues late. From the terminal, I could see that it was an <b>A321</b>. The bridge was obscuring the airline name, so I didn't know till I was on the plane. And I'm not one of those guys who can tell you every airline by the two digits on the checkin counter. The ticket was printed on a "Swiss" ticket thingy, which was strange. Anyhow, I'm getting into too many details now. Back to the story:
I got on the plane, and was glad to see that it had a generous seating arrangement. Instead of the usual 40 rows, or whatever usually gets packed onto a 321, the only had about half that. I'd say between 16 and 20 rows of seats. To boot, instead of the usual 3+3 arrangement, they had two really wide seats on each side. Sandwiched between these two really wide seats, they had a very narrow "baby seat". It was like any other seat, except that it was really, really narrow. Well suited for a one year-old. Or a Chihuaua. Or a loaf of bread. You get the picture. Anyhow on the headrest, it said "<b>Air Méditerranée</b>". But I kind of figured that when I boarded the plane, cause instead of the usual "Guten Morgen" we were greeted by a friendly "Bonjour".
I plopped my butt into the seat, and was delighted by the amount of leg room. I could not, while sitting, touch the seat in front of me, with my feet. It was THAT far away. In fact, it was soooo far away, that it rendered the tray-table completely useless. Each seat had a small tray-table stowed away in the armrest. Even the Chihuaua seat.
There were about 40 of us on the plane that morning. And a cabin crew of six or so. Quite attractive girls, I might add. I think there was a male flight attendent too, but I didn't pay much attention to him. They handed out newspapers. We pushed back, taxied to the runway and took off. After takeoff, we made (roughly) a 90 degree RH turn and headed more or less South. It was sunny in Germany. The next 40 minutes were uneventful. Then one of the pilots come on and said "blah, blah, blah Paris". Couldn't understand more than that. Not sure if it was cause of the thick French accent, or cause I was listening to my iPod. Anyhow, I thought we must be flying overhead Paris. I looked out my window, nothing, wrong side of the plane. I went to the other side, and sure enough, there she was: Paris in the Fall. The Eifel Tower was easy to make out next to the Sienne. The Arc de Triomph, and Champs Elysees were visible, too. We kept flying.
About 20 minutes after flying over Paris, I looked out the window, up and forward, where I could see an aricraft flying parallel. We were slowly catching up to it. It was a KLM 737 flying about 2000 feet higher and about 2000 feet East of us. I've often seen other aircraft while flying, but never this close. This 737 had some dark blue markings (perhaps advertising) on the front part of the fuselage. After about five minutes it was out of view.
Lunchtime. We ate curried chicken with rice, lots of good cheeses, buns, and a pretty tasty chocolate fudge-type desert. We were given <b>metal cutlery, including knives</b>. Something I had only experienced twice on an aircraft since September 14th, 2001, both times on a charter.
I don't smoke. Not anymore. Well except for the odd cigarello. Anyhow, they made the announcement that I never thought I'd ever hear again: Ladies and Gentlemen, smoking is permitted in rows xx to xx (the back 3 rows of the aircraft, I don't recall the row numbers). Well I was feeling nostalgic, and very liberated, so can you guess what I did? Yes, I took my coffee, bummed a cigarett off the guy sitting accross from me, and went to the back of the plane to have a smoke. I still can't believe it. <b>I smoked in an airplane on October 10th, 2005</b>. I thought there wasn't a plane left in the Western world that permitted smoking. I light up at 10 000 meters. But I didn't inhale.
I returned to my seat and worked for about 45 minutes. Then we started our descent. Uneventful. Till about 10 minutes before landing. I was looking out the window, watching the clouds that we were flying htrough, go by. I was sitting just aft the wing. Suddenly I saw noumerous really, really bright simultaneous flashes along the outer third of the wing. The flashes were accompanied instantaneously by a very quick succession of loud bang-boom. It was a <b>lightning strike</b>.
I was completely dumbfoundend. I don't recall being afraid, but I did have a feeling of uncertainty. I looked around and saw that all the other pax wer also looking around hoping for reassuring glances from their neighbours. The plane sounded normal, flew normal, so everything was still normal. Except for some pax with soiled underwear. What I found particularly interesting, is that the turbulence level around the time of the lightning strike was relatively mild. Sure we were being shaken around a bit, but nothing major. I always associated lightning with thunderclouds and severe turbulence. Guess I was wrong.
We continued with our approach. We came out of the clouds. I figure we must have been at about 5000 feet. It was early afternoon. I could see cattered showers were in the area, but there were also large areas where there was no low cloud cover. We popped in and out of such areas. Suddenly, <b>the plane dropped a significant amount over a 2-3 second period</b>. (I once had a hell-ride flying into a thunderstorm-ridden Las Vegas in 1996, so I know all about negative G's.) We did not experience negative G's this time, but it was still enough to make it seem like a mini roller coaster ride. Enough to make some of the ladies scream, which the men found amusing. ;-) But it ended ans quickly as it began, and we landed 5 minutes later, uneventfully. Total flying time 2:50.
Intermezzo: If you have the chance, visit Granada - especially the Alhambra.
Our return flight (on the same aircraft) departed at about 14:00 Today. That morning, it had actually flown back to Germany, and picked up another group to fly to Granada. The other group landed in Granada at about 13:15. The <b>plane did NOT fuel up</b>. Our return flight was 2:40, so<b> the A321 had flown a total of 5 1/2 hours including two takeoffs to cruise altitude, with only one fillup</b>. I didn't think it was possible for an A321 to do that. Must have been the light load. Your thoughts?
The return flight was less eventful. On the ground in Granada there was an Iberia DC-9 (or MD 8x) and a Ryanair 737.
Again we passed a 737 over France, flying parallel, This one was further away, and the speed difference again was small. I couldn't tell what airline it was. It was white, and we were heading North, over Bordeaux.
Again the food was amazing. More cool cheeses, squid salad (I think), steak and potatoes, desert and metal cutlery. Oh, and about 30 minutes before the meal, we got a couple of <b>bags of mixed nuts</b> and rasins (no peanuts). I didn't think they served any kinds of nuts on flights anymore. Your thoughts?
We descended towards Cologne. I could see the airport at 2 o'clock. We then turned left slightly an then a long, gradual right hand turn into CGN. I could see the big, famous Cologne Dome the whole time, as we basically flew a big circle around downtown.
As we landed, I could see a <b>Air Berlin A320</b>, which I had never seen before.
Anyhow, that's the synopsis. I hope my next trip is less eventful. <b>Feel free to comment</b>.
..........
Here's a quick synopsis of the flight segments on my two day trip to <b>Granada, Spain</b>. Sorry if it's not quite as structured as it could have been.
I fly quite regularly. Without getting too much into detail about why I fly to where I do, I usually fly to a destination and return the next day. When I fly, it's mostly on business. Often charter flights. I usually fly out of FRA, CGN, or MUC and fly within Europe. Usually into busy airports, sometimes into "obscure" airports. Usually the flights are quite uneventful. Not worth writing about. But I decided to share the past 24 hours with you, at least the airbourne parts, cause several "unique" things occured. Things that I found rather interesting.
I arrived at Germany's <b>Cologne</b> airport early. We were not due to depart till 10:20 Monday morning, with check in opening at 9:20 AM. I was early, cause this time of year is fog-time in Germany, which can really slow you down, especially if you have to travel 180 km to get to the airport. I checked in, and went through security. We finally boarded the plane, late. I don't remember exactly how late cause at the time, I didn't think that I'd be writing about it. Anyhow, I figure the flight was about 45 mintues late. From the terminal, I could see that it was an <b>A321</b>. The bridge was obscuring the airline name, so I didn't know till I was on the plane. And I'm not one of those guys who can tell you every airline by the two digits on the checkin counter. The ticket was printed on a "Swiss" ticket thingy, which was strange. Anyhow, I'm getting into too many details now. Back to the story:
I got on the plane, and was glad to see that it had a generous seating arrangement. Instead of the usual 40 rows, or whatever usually gets packed onto a 321, the only had about half that. I'd say between 16 and 20 rows of seats. To boot, instead of the usual 3+3 arrangement, they had two really wide seats on each side. Sandwiched between these two really wide seats, they had a very narrow "baby seat". It was like any other seat, except that it was really, really narrow. Well suited for a one year-old. Or a Chihuaua. Or a loaf of bread. You get the picture. Anyhow on the headrest, it said "<b>Air Méditerranée</b>". But I kind of figured that when I boarded the plane, cause instead of the usual "Guten Morgen" we were greeted by a friendly "Bonjour".
I plopped my butt into the seat, and was delighted by the amount of leg room. I could not, while sitting, touch the seat in front of me, with my feet. It was THAT far away. In fact, it was soooo far away, that it rendered the tray-table completely useless. Each seat had a small tray-table stowed away in the armrest. Even the Chihuaua seat.
There were about 40 of us on the plane that morning. And a cabin crew of six or so. Quite attractive girls, I might add. I think there was a male flight attendent too, but I didn't pay much attention to him. They handed out newspapers. We pushed back, taxied to the runway and took off. After takeoff, we made (roughly) a 90 degree RH turn and headed more or less South. It was sunny in Germany. The next 40 minutes were uneventful. Then one of the pilots come on and said "blah, blah, blah Paris". Couldn't understand more than that. Not sure if it was cause of the thick French accent, or cause I was listening to my iPod. Anyhow, I thought we must be flying overhead Paris. I looked out my window, nothing, wrong side of the plane. I went to the other side, and sure enough, there she was: Paris in the Fall. The Eifel Tower was easy to make out next to the Sienne. The Arc de Triomph, and Champs Elysees were visible, too. We kept flying.
About 20 minutes after flying over Paris, I looked out the window, up and forward, where I could see an aricraft flying parallel. We were slowly catching up to it. It was a KLM 737 flying about 2000 feet higher and about 2000 feet East of us. I've often seen other aircraft while flying, but never this close. This 737 had some dark blue markings (perhaps advertising) on the front part of the fuselage. After about five minutes it was out of view.
Lunchtime. We ate curried chicken with rice, lots of good cheeses, buns, and a pretty tasty chocolate fudge-type desert. We were given <b>metal cutlery, including knives</b>. Something I had only experienced twice on an aircraft since September 14th, 2001, both times on a charter.
I don't smoke. Not anymore. Well except for the odd cigarello. Anyhow, they made the announcement that I never thought I'd ever hear again: Ladies and Gentlemen, smoking is permitted in rows xx to xx (the back 3 rows of the aircraft, I don't recall the row numbers). Well I was feeling nostalgic, and very liberated, so can you guess what I did? Yes, I took my coffee, bummed a cigarett off the guy sitting accross from me, and went to the back of the plane to have a smoke. I still can't believe it. <b>I smoked in an airplane on October 10th, 2005</b>. I thought there wasn't a plane left in the Western world that permitted smoking. I light up at 10 000 meters. But I didn't inhale.
I returned to my seat and worked for about 45 minutes. Then we started our descent. Uneventful. Till about 10 minutes before landing. I was looking out the window, watching the clouds that we were flying htrough, go by. I was sitting just aft the wing. Suddenly I saw noumerous really, really bright simultaneous flashes along the outer third of the wing. The flashes were accompanied instantaneously by a very quick succession of loud bang-boom. It was a <b>lightning strike</b>.
I was completely dumbfoundend. I don't recall being afraid, but I did have a feeling of uncertainty. I looked around and saw that all the other pax wer also looking around hoping for reassuring glances from their neighbours. The plane sounded normal, flew normal, so everything was still normal. Except for some pax with soiled underwear. What I found particularly interesting, is that the turbulence level around the time of the lightning strike was relatively mild. Sure we were being shaken around a bit, but nothing major. I always associated lightning with thunderclouds and severe turbulence. Guess I was wrong.
We continued with our approach. We came out of the clouds. I figure we must have been at about 5000 feet. It was early afternoon. I could see cattered showers were in the area, but there were also large areas where there was no low cloud cover. We popped in and out of such areas. Suddenly, <b>the plane dropped a significant amount over a 2-3 second period</b>. (I once had a hell-ride flying into a thunderstorm-ridden Las Vegas in 1996, so I know all about negative G's.) We did not experience negative G's this time, but it was still enough to make it seem like a mini roller coaster ride. Enough to make some of the ladies scream, which the men found amusing. ;-) But it ended ans quickly as it began, and we landed 5 minutes later, uneventfully. Total flying time 2:50.
Intermezzo: If you have the chance, visit Granada - especially the Alhambra.
Our return flight (on the same aircraft) departed at about 14:00 Today. That morning, it had actually flown back to Germany, and picked up another group to fly to Granada. The other group landed in Granada at about 13:15. The <b>plane did NOT fuel up</b>. Our return flight was 2:40, so<b> the A321 had flown a total of 5 1/2 hours including two takeoffs to cruise altitude, with only one fillup</b>. I didn't think it was possible for an A321 to do that. Must have been the light load. Your thoughts?
The return flight was less eventful. On the ground in Granada there was an Iberia DC-9 (or MD 8x) and a Ryanair 737.
Again we passed a 737 over France, flying parallel, This one was further away, and the speed difference again was small. I couldn't tell what airline it was. It was white, and we were heading North, over Bordeaux.
Again the food was amazing. More cool cheeses, squid salad (I think), steak and potatoes, desert and metal cutlery. Oh, and about 30 minutes before the meal, we got a couple of <b>bags of mixed nuts</b> and rasins (no peanuts). I didn't think they served any kinds of nuts on flights anymore. Your thoughts?
We descended towards Cologne. I could see the airport at 2 o'clock. We then turned left slightly an then a long, gradual right hand turn into CGN. I could see the big, famous Cologne Dome the whole time, as we basically flew a big circle around downtown.
As we landed, I could see a <b>Air Berlin A320</b>, which I had never seen before.
Anyhow, that's the synopsis. I hope my next trip is less eventful. <b>Feel free to comment</b>.