djwald

Hi - I am traveling in 2 weeks from MSP to PHL arriving at 7.43pm. My connecting flight to AMS (international flight in Envoy) departs at 8.50pm. This is a published flight schedule, but in anybody's experience out there, is it realistic that I will make the connecting flight? Any idea if the MSP flight arrival gate is close enough for me to run?

Thanks in advance!

USFlyer26

While it is a published "legal" connection, and should be fine, the slightest delay could make you miss your flight to AMS.

Flight 1408 continues on to BOS from MSP, and flights to/from BOS are supposed to arrive and depart from the high C gates in PHL, so you'll most likely arrive somewhere in the vicinity of C18-C20. Terminal A east is a bit closer from there, but if you're leaving out of the high A gates, it's decently far.

I'd say that from Terminal C to Terminal A is a good 3-5 minute jog. I'm 6'5" tall, so my strides are pretty long - YMMV.

If I were you, I'd try to move up to an earlier flight to PHL to be safe.

geo1005

Your flight (US#1408) from MSP to PHL has a very good on-time rating (89% on time+). Even if your flight is a few minutes late getting in to PHL, you should have no trouble going directly from your flight to the AMS departure gate in Terminal A. Just don't stop along the way for anything.

If you have the time to kill, you could change (or Move Up) to the 1:45 PM departure from MSP. Of course that gives you several hours to kill in Philly but it may offer peace of mind.

djwald

Thanks for your quick reply. Common sense probably says to try to take an earlier flight out of MSP. Cheers....

djwald

Ah geo1005 - did't see your reply there! Appreciate your feedback as well. I'll sit on this a little while longer. It wouldn't be such a big deal, but if I can get a few more hours in MSP, it means more business meetings, so I'll way it up closer to the time (and probably keep an eye on the weather too).

Azzuristar

Second this. Plz take an earlier jet if possible.

GNRMatt

I would take the earlier flight. If you have several hours to kill in PHL, hopefully you'll be bringing a tablet or laptop that you can load with a few extra movies to watch. That'd be better than missing your Int'l connection. If you miss your connection, you probably won't get to Amsterdam for at least 24 hours, although maybe they can re-route you with a connection to get you there sooner.

Lovethecabin

We do the most of our flying (domestic and international) via PHL connections and I would not willingly cut it that close, especially if there weren't other flights in case you miss that connectin.

Even when all went according to plan, more than once we boarded the connection with the door closing behind us. I no longer consider any PHL connection with less than a 90 minute layover.

djwald

thanks all for your replies. I think the choice is pretty clear...there is a decent Japanese restaurant at least I can hang for a while. Plus the 'lounge'.

diburning

I connected through PHL yesterday and the connection time was 2 hours for a domestic flight (I booked them that way).

We arrived at PHL about 15 minutes early, and there was no one around to operate the jet bridge. We sat there for 45 minutes at terminal C (for some reason they routed us here. This was a USX flight operated by Republic which generally uses Terminal B). I was glad that I padded the connection time because if I didn't, and had booked an earlier connecting flight instead, I would have missed the connecting flight as the connection time would have been 35 minutes.

The lesson here is to ALWAYS pad your connection time. Even if it seems excessive, there are plenty of places to eat and things to do at the connecting airport.

CrizzleColts

Yikes! 45 minutes waiting on the jetbridge? That's spectacularly bad.

phlwookie

Indeed it is - and it's an area they're much better about in my experience vs. the bankruptcy days, where I had three flights one year with missing jet bridge operators that resulted in 45 minute waits. I can't even recall a recent missing operator at PHL or CLT.

kimharp

I almost replied to this thread earlier with exactly this. I can't tell you how many times this has happened to me in PHL (I live in Philly). You arrive early, and then wind up being late, because there isn't anyone to operate the freaking jetbridge. Given this, plus the fact that Int. flights board 45 mins in advance (even earlier sometimes in my experience), plus any other tiny thing that could go wrong, I would definitely take that earlier connection.

Often1

Don't forget that US requires you to be at the departure gate no later than T-30 or your seat is subject to cancellation. This matters if the flight is oversold at that point as US can cancel your seat, give it to a standby and it owes you nothing for IDB and avoids VDB for somebody else. You are then stuck waiting a day or hoping there's availability to AMS through some other routing.

thomwithanh

+1

Since you're in Envoy you can also access the club during the layover in PHL. The location near the A gates is quite nice, with soup and other goodies to nosh on while you're waiting.