This is my mini-trip report of a flight on British Airways' UK Domestic service from Glasgow (GLA) to Heathrow (LHR) - normally extremely boring and run of the mill, except last weekend BA decided to operate it with a long-haul Boeing 747-400!

12th October 2014
BA1497
GLA - LHR
G-BYGE, Boeing 747-436
Seat 17J, Club World

Scheduled departure 1945
Actual departure 2042
Scheduled arrival 2109
Actual arrival 2155

This flight was originally scheduled to be operated by one of BA's shorthaul configuration Boeing 767-300s, which mainly operate European services but also a number of domestic runs up to Edinburgh and Glasgow to provide extra capacity. I always try to book on a 767-operated service given the choice as they provide a bit of change from BA's usual Airbus A320-family fare, and the 767s are due for withdrawal from the fleet over the next few years. So far this year I've travelled to/from ARN, FCO and MAD on them.

I first realised this trip was going to be a bit different when I arrived at GLA and downloaded my boarding pass to find that a 40 minute delay was showing and my window seat in the front cabin section of the 767 had been changed to an aisle - 17J. Initially I thought BA had substituted one of their longhaul 767s for the shorthaul aircraft that had originally been scheduled (something which is increasingly common with the ageing fleet) and I was a little annoyed as I like a window seat, and 17J would be in the World Traveller section of the LH 767.

I logged into the BA website to see if I could switch to a better seat to be met with this:



Yes, BA were apparently planning to use a 747-400 on this flight! Not quite believing my eyes I checked the seat map, and indeed, a 747 was loaded up. Better still, my 17J was a Club World seat on the main deck - so I'd be experiencing a flat bed on a 1 hour UK domestic flight! Unfortunately there were no free seats showing elsewhere in Club World (or indeed in First), so the choice of Club World vs moving back into World Traveller just to get a window was easy - I of course stuck where I was.

I quickly went through security and made my way to the BA Galleries lounge. Although I had some work to do, my first instinct was to get onto FlyerTalk to find out if what it looked like was about to happen was actually true. I quickly found out that another FTer, MsCapricorn, was on the outbound BA1492 from LHR-GLA, and it indeed was a 747 that was operating as the booked 767 had gone tech.

The 40 minute delay continued to show on the departure boards whilst I was in the lounge, but as we got closer to the scheduled time I could overhear the lounge agent advising passengers who were just arriving that the flight had been changed to be operated by a 'Jumbo', but that they were hoping to make up some of the delay. Through monitoring FlightRadar24 (and MsCapricorn's updates on the BAEC FT board) I could see when the inbound flight arrived, and sure enough at around 1915 the lounge agent announced that we were ready for boarding.

The aircraft had had to park on one of the international gates at GLA rather than the usual domestic stand on the pier where the BA lounge is situated, so it was a bit of a trek around to the boarding gate. I in fact almost got lost, the signage to other piers outside the lounge not being very clear at all, although I guess this isn't a typical 'move' from the BA lounge.

I eventually made it to the gate to be greeted with this beautiful sight which will never fail to make me smile:



(Apologies for the poor quality of the photos in this report, by the way - all taken on my phone as I hadn't anticipated doing a TR and so didn't have my trusty DSLR with me)

Thankfully they had indeed just started fast-track boarding, and unusually there was no queue so I was straight onto the airbridge which was attached to door 2L of the aircraft. The friendly cabin crew greeted me at the door (always a good sign, the purser on my outbound flight to GLA managed to completely ignore me as I boarded which definitely set things up for what was a middling flight) and I quickly found my way around to 17J, which was just around the corner near the under-stairs 'office'. I was impressed to see the crew had bothered to put out blankets and headphones on the CW seats:



The view across to the window before my seatmate arrived:



Looking out towards the galley and office. The toilet was just to the right but it wasn't bothersome on such a short flight, however I could imagine this would be an issue if you were in this seat on an overnighter:



Although we started boarding on time, we didn't end up pushing back until probably 2030. Being next to the office I could hear the conversations between the CSM and flight crew - it transpired that there were four passengers missing. They made several PA announcements on board to see if the missing four had sneaked through (although these were VERY difficult to hear, the PA is quite obviously not ageing well on these birds), but eventually I think all were found and nobody had to be offloaded. The senior first officer made a couple of PAs to keep everybody informed, and reassured us that they would 'fly faster' to make up some of the time - I guess you have that option with 4 engines rather than 2 at your disposal.

During the delay I amused myself watching the smiles on other passengers' faces as they realised they were on a plane that was a bit different to the usual. The CSM also came around to introduce herself and say hello - the second time this has happened to me out of my first three flights as a Gold on BA, and appreciated - it does give you a warm fuzzy feeling!

After we eventually pushed back, the safety video was shown on the IFE screens as is usual on the 747 fleet (I would have taken a sneaky pic but one of the cabin crew was standing right by my seat to do the manual parts of the demo so I was good and paid attention) and after a short taxi out we were borne up into the sky by those four beautiful RB211 engines.

Once up in the air we had the usual welcome announcement from the CSM, who warned that due to the size of the aircraft they might struggle to get the drinks service around to everybody, and apologised to those who might be missed out - I thought it was nice that she was honest about this. Sure enough, as soon as the flight crew had released the cabin crew, they were up out of their seats and rushing about trying to get everything sorted for the service run.

I was impressed to see that the IFE had been turned on even for this short flight - even more luxury than expected! I decided it wouldn't be worth starting to watch something that would no doubt be curtailed as we started the descent into LHR and the screens had to go away, so I put on the moving map, dropped my footstool, reclined my seat and got on with the crossword:



Being at the front of this CW cabin section also had the advantage that I was served almost first on the drinks run. Things were run a little differently to the usual domestic service - the snack basket was brought round first, then the trolley came out separately for drinks. I went for my usual G+T with some of the yummy Thai Street Food mix; the crew member was very apologetic when she had to give me a paper coffee cup to drink it out of because they had no glassware! (I can understand why the usual CW glasses weren't loaded, and perhaps they'd run out of the plastic glasses that are normally used in domestic):



Another view of the moving map as our journey continued - not a journey that is normally seen on a CW IFE screen:



All too soon we started descending towards London. The flight crew came on the PA to warn that there would be a few ATC delays during the arrival, and sure enough we made two or three circuits around the Bovingdon stack before making our approach to LHR, from the west today due to the prevailing winds. We landed on runway 09L and the crew made an impressive high-speed turn-off to try to minimise our taxi time into terminal 5.

This was what our course looked like on FR24:





Of course BA had one more bit of fun planned for us that I was anticipating but that I'm sure many people on board weren't. We arrived into one of the T5B satellite gates, which aren't equipped for domestic arrivals - the only suitable gates for this are on the main T5A building. So this meant having to hop on a dreaded Heathrow bus to be moved from the B gate to the domestic arrivals area. I have to say I didn't mind this one bit - I love watching planes so any trip around the back roads of terminal 5 is usually enormous fun for me!

I had expected that we would leave via an airbridge and then exit out onto the tarmac, but in fact we used traditional airstairs, even more fun. There was a bit of confusion initially about whether the steps were being brought to doors 1L or 2L, the wait giving me some time to have a chat to the lovely cabin crew member who had been looking after me, who was telling me about the unpredictability of being on standby crew, how she hadn't expected to be going to GLA and how she was operating out to SIN and SYD later in the week - lucky her!

Eventually the steps arrived at 2L and we were deposited into a dark and drizzly Heathrow:





Now that's a proper engine. Could do witch some touching up on the R-R badge though.



And so ended what was probably the most bizarre but enjoyable flight of my BA travels so far. Fair play to BA for not just cancelling the flight and making us all catch the train, but for 'thinking outside the box' a bit, and well done to the crew who really worked hard to serve everybody and still kept smiling. And this all reminded me why I have such a soft spot for the old Queen of the Skies - a 1 month old 747-400 was the first aircraft I ever flew on back in 1994, and she never fails to cheer me up. Here's hoping I have many more BA flights on the old ladies before they finally fly off to Mojave forever - but perhaps not on UK domestic...

James