25 March 01 EW 982 (aka LH 2280) ATR 72 CGN-DRS dep 1855 arr 2025 Seat 11A

March 25th marks the first day of Eurowings' new identity as a full-blown LH partner. And there I am, booked on EW 982 / LH 2280 from Cologne to Dresden.

Check-in via Lufthansa's webpage does not quite work for this flight ("no etix data available") even though I booked the flight under the LH code, but hey, it's Sunday and CGN airport hardly ever has a line to begin with.

I am at the airport at 18.00 for a 18.55 departure. Check-in is quick (no line at all), there's time for a sip of LH's free coffee in the departure area as well as to pick-up a newspaper.

The Eurowings plane wears standard EW colors, unlike the one that used to operate for LH on the CGN-LEJ-CGN route, which used "quasi" LH colors. EW operates in a one-class layout.

Departure is on-time, passenger load is maybe
40 people. The ATR is nice enough, if somewhat noisy. EW will maintain a separate identity, even though almost all EW scheduled flights are now code-shared with LH. The two flight attendants serve a snack consisting of grapes, as well as two small pastries, plus coffee/tea & cold beverage service. In my opinion this beats LH mainline hands down in both economy (no snack) and business (smaller snack), but is certainly a step down from what LH Cityline serves on international flights of a similar distance. A second beverage service & chocolate round off the service.

Arrival at Dresden is on-time, baggage is waiting for me on the belt, the Avis counter is right outside, and off I am.

Side note: Renting from Avis gained me 3000 LH miles (LP promotion), while the roundtrip on EW got me only 2000 (despite flying in the most expensive fare class). It's a crazy world.

26 March 01 EW 985 (aka LH 2285) ATR 72 DRS-CGN dep 1305 arr 1420 Seat 4A

Check-in at Dresden's new terminal (opened yesterday, I think). Old hangar building which now looks remarkably like HAM's Terminal Four. Only about 20 check-in positions, but a nice, compact terminal with a decent observation area.

Unfortunately traffic consists mostly of LH's various mainline and partner flights, plus a number of holiday charters. Besides of LH it seems that only Crossair operates scheduled services from DRS to international destinations. Saw a Cityair (former OLT?) plane parked on the tarmac and a BAE 146 in Flightline colors which probably operates for LH as well.

Nice departure area, lot's of space and windows. Decent selection of newspapers in the departure area, plus the usual LH coffee machines. DRS boasts both FTL and SEN lounges, but I am still separated by about 10,000 miles from FTL (too many flights on non-Star LH partners...). But next time...

Flight is uneventful, service is very similar to the last one - grapes, pastries, two drink services, chocolate. Departure is on-time, baggage arrives when we get off the bus. Load factor was again about 50%.

In summary: Eurowings certainly is a nice regional airline, service was better than on my last EW flight to AMS (code-shared with KLM) in 1999. I do find the ATR quite noisy, but I would not hesitate to fly them again. Getting LH miles now certainly helps...