Originally Posted by
brysal
I am new to Turkish Airlines and have an upcoming trip next week from DEL - IST - JFK and am looking forward to the experience. I have searched for recent reports of the inflight experience but haven't found anything current. Has anyone flown from New Delhi on the 6am flight? Lounge in New Delhi? How early do we really need to get to the airport for the early morning departure? Is the one hour to connection in Istanbul going to be straightforward? Any meal information for either flight?
Just curious overall and would love the insight from the experts! Thanks in advance.
Haven't done J, only Y+. Around the time I flew (end March), DEL got a lot of equipment swaps to the 332, which has a distinct J product( I flew the route in Y). Can't comment on the lounge in DEL.
The food in Y was excellent so u expect J will be great as well.
I believe there are 2 or 3 daily flights to NYC. This is a blessing in disguise. IST in April was ( I m being charitable) a gong show. N America flights have some absurd system for security. So depending on the gate you arrive at, there's a separate security section either a little bit before or after the absolute mess that is security. This security section is towards the windows, as opposed to the regular security section, which is next to lthe transfer desks and oriented towards the inside of the building. First you go to one set of desks (on the side closer to security). They look at your passport, put a sticker and send you to a second set of desks that are 25 feet away (on the side farther away from security). They will add another sticker. After this you may join the regular security line.
Since there is no priority security (well there want in april), by this point you will be behind planeloads of people. If you re lucky, you ll get through in 15 min. Many people have reported longer times. Took me around 20-25 min (but I am navigated the N. America desks faster than others - 10 min). Suffice it to say, unless something has changed dramatically in the last few months, the possibility of chaos at security remains, so while I think you should make it through all the security points within 15-20 min, you never know. The security check is unpleasant - lots of angry pax who re almost definitely going to miss cnx. Hence you being lucky with the multiple departures to NYC.
Hopefully things have improved but 1 hr is cutting it very close, especially if your aircraft ends up on a remote stand like mine did.
TK is excellent in the air, but in the ground it's got the same bureaucracy raj apathy that drives me up the wall in India.
Two additional points - the IST-JFK legs will likely be much better. New planes, some with WIFI.
As for DEL, there's not much traffic at that time, so two hours should be enough (unless you want to use the lounge a lot). Track the inbound flight - it ll give you an idea of your real estimated time of deparure. The inbound flight may be delayed due to congestion in IST.