British Airways Boeing 747-400 at Seattle
Although I know many readers of this site are more interested about the flight itself, I tend to be more intrigued with what goes one between searching for a ticket and stepping on to the plane. Odd for some, I know, but I wanted to share my own insight.
My most recent adventure started when I decided to go to Paris (CDG) from Seattle (SEA) for vacation. After some work, I narrowed my dates to flying out on a Thursday so that I could have a full weekend in-country. Last year, I made the same trip on Icelandair and chose that airline mostly on having the lowest fare. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to go with the lowest fare this time; I was also interested in the experience, so I decided to start my ticket hunt early. This all resulted with me flying on a British Airways Boeing 747-400 out of Seattle.
ANA To resume 787 service on the Seattle to Tokyo flights from Fall 2013 – Image: All Nippon Airways
Today All Nippon Airways (ANA) announced that as of the 20th of September 2013, they will be returning the 787 Dreamliner to its daily service from Tokyo’s Narita Airport (NRT) to Seattle (SEA).
The service was started on October 1st 2012, when ANA was the first commercial operator to service Seattle with a 787. However, the route was cancelled after the grounding and battery fire dramas. On the 1st of June the service to Seattle resumed, but a Boeing 777-300ER was used instead. With the resumption of daily flights to Seattle this adds a second daily 787 service to North America with daily flights on the Tokyo to San Jose route as well (which will begin daily service on the 10th July).
Icelandair Boeing 757 in Seattle (SEA).
On May 16th, 2013, Icelandair flew its inaugural flight from Anchorage (ANC) to Keflavàk (KEF) in Iceland. I was not able to swing a trip up to ANC for the festivities, but I was able to take their flight from Seattle (SEA) and join in with the celebration in Iceland. This is my review of flying Icelandair to Iceland and back. Notice: Icelandair covered my trip to/from Iceland. All opinions are my own.
I have flown internationally before and the standard international travel excitement led me to show up way too early. I arrived at noon and still had thirty minutes until Icelandair’s ticket counter opened. Since the airline doesn’t fly every few minutes, they don’t staff their counters at all hours of the day and night — which makes sense. I tend to forget this since I mainly travel with larger carriers and have little problem getting to the airport super early.
Promptly at noon, an Icelandair ticket agent had the place running, checked in my bag, and had me on my way. They recently adopted online check-in and ticketing and it worked perfectly. No paper, no fuss.
ANA Boeing 787 at Paine Field. Photo by David Parker Brown.
As 787s around the world return to the sky after the infamous battery incident, airlines work to get their aircraft back to full utilization. United Airlines resumed domestic services between its major hubs of Houston, Chicago & San Francisco, while Qatar Airways returned their Dreamliner to their short Dubai route before starting service back up to London. All Nippon Airways (ANA), which currently operates the largest 787 fleet of 18 aircraft, will start putting their 787s back to service starting June 1.
Prior to the battery incidents, ANA operates two Dreamliner flights to North America: Seattle (SEA) and San Jose (SJC). Once the grounding came into effect both routes were suspended and the industry speculated what would happen to the destinations. Other 787 services like Frankfurt & Beijing (both served from Tokyo Haneda) were changed to other aircraft to keep them active. Would SJC and SEA remain 787 destinations? Yes and no.
The ground is painted to prepare for an Airbus A380 at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport. Photo by Brandon Farris.
For most passengers, they probably do not notice the painted lines below the planes at the gate showing where the front wheel should be for different aircraft types. But for an AvGeek, it is always fun to see what aircraft a gate can handle.
Currently, there are no Airbus A380 aircraft flown into Seattle-Tacoma International Airport (SEA), but will that change soon? This week, three gates at the South Terminal had “A380” painted on the ground, but why? Sigh… turns out still no A380 service — for now.
“Yes, that is an A380 spot,” Perry Cooper Airport Media and Public Affairs Manager for SEA explained to AirlineReporter.com. “It is marked just for emergency purposes. That would be the space we’d park it. We do have a couple of other spots marked for it in the cargo area.”
Perry also pointed out the the airport does not have the facilities, such as double jet bridges, to handle the A380 on anything more than an emergency basis. The airport is planning on only having one gate prepared for the A380 and will be making the decision which one of the gates (S11, S15, S16) will make the cut.
Currently, there are only two airlines operating the Boeing 747-400 out of Seattle (Eva Air and British Airways — and Delta starting later this year) and having additional opportunities to spot large birds is always welcomed.
Although short-term we will unlikely see an A380 flying out of SEA, that could change in the future. There are three airlines that operate the A380 and also fly to Seattle: Emirates, Lufthansa and Korean Air. If one of them would start A380 operations, but my guess would be Emirates. But at this time, the airport states that they are not in talks with any airlines on starting A380 service.
Seattle continues to grow with additional international traffic to Asia and Europe and I could see the demand for the A380 happening in the future.
 |
This story written by…David Parker Brown, Editor & Founder.
David started AirlineReporter.com in the summer of 2008, but has had a passion for aviation since he was a kid. Born and raised in the Seattle area (where he is currently based) has surely had an influence and he couldn’t imagine living anywhere else in the world.
@AirlineReporter | Flickr | YouTube |
