UA pilot surprises soldier son

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Apr 29, 2016, 1:39 am

JOSECONLSCREW28

Original Poster

Join Date: Aug 2009

Location: EWR, BDL

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UA pilot surprises soldier son

http://www.kiro7.com/news/trending-now/dad-surprises-soldier-son-as-captain-of-his-flight-home/248137698

Just thought I'd share this happy story

Apr 29, 2016, 2:06 am

Ted

Join Date: Oct 1999

Location: EWR / PHL

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Above link seems to be out of service... see below from ABC:

http://abcnews.go.com/US/father-surp...ry?id=38704096

Apr 29, 2016, 6:02 am

mh3265a

Join Date: Nov 2008

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Really great story!

Apr 29, 2016, 7:20 am

FlyHighInTheSky

Join Date: Oct 2014

Location: ORD

Programs: UA GS

Posts: 659

So awesome, brought a tear to the eye.

To top it off, the son got to sit in 2K GF seat, the best one on the plane!

Apr 29, 2016, 7:41 am

wrp96

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Thanks for making me cry. Awesome story.

Apr 29, 2016, 11:47 am

MostlyUA

Join Date: Jul 2015

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wow! touching story. What a deep moving experience for Dad.

Interesting observation: US Army chartered a 3 class plane? I see soldiers all the time on flights to FRA and ICN, but they sit way in the back. Maybe officers get to fly BF.

Apr 29, 2016, 1:16 pm

phxrsng

Join Date: Oct 2013

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Quote:

Originally Posted by MostlyUA

My guess would be that if the DoD is buying tickets on commercial flights its Economy, but in the case where they're transporting large numbers by chartering the entire plane the premium cabin goes by rank/seniority.

Not like they arent going to use the GF/BF cabins if they have the entire plane.

Apr 30, 2016, 4:07 am

mh3265a

Join Date: Nov 2008

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Quote:

Originally Posted by phxrsng

YEP - TRANSCOM likely chartered the flight to get servicemembers back stateside. Plus, regular commercial Kuwait flights ended back in January...

Apr 30, 2016, 5:58 am

Paolo01

Join Date: Mar 2007

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Quote:

Originally Posted by MostlyUA

As mentioned earlier it was a TRANSCOM flight. You could only see army in the footage but there would have been service members from all branches and probably even a few DoD contractors in the plane. Norfolk VA is a gateway city for these types of flights. Largest unit on the plane is probably out of VA.

It is always a real treat to get a "real" commercial airplane back vice military or a stripped down charter/logistics aircraft.

Love this video. Not sure how United pulled it off, but this story is more important to me than my upgrade which cleared for tomorrow. Thank you United.