Originally Posted by phx2lhr

Actually I fly this route regularly also and I, too, was night stopped on the 289, for the second time in two months, last Saturday. I agree it was a huge mess although a colleague in the back said it was way worse in the heat there. It was almost as bad a fiasco in May. Twice looks like carelessness, no?

One of the ground crew at Phoenix had happened to me to mention at checkin on the outbound last week that the oldest 747's are being allocated to this route-those "destined for the scrapyard" as it was put to me-and they are therefore anticipating many more of these problems. This presumably connects with the recently announced removal of old First from 289 starting on Oct 26, because they will not be replacing the suites on the oldest planes but just leave them until the planes are junked (I didn't notice if it was new or old First on this flight.) He believes that all the delays and breakdowns of this type will backfire on BA.

I have to say the flight has indeed been convenient and generally good-though I have several times had delays of several hours-but this experience twice in two months has very sadly made me look at other carriers for the future despite the extra connections it'll entail.