hi-guy

While a relative newcomer, my first flights US33/US226 were on 11/24/2012, I was impressed by the experience; especially the positive attitude of the employees I encountered (TAs, GAs, and FAs). Since I had no status, I signed up for the Silver Trial prior to the flights since the HNL/PHX/BOS roundtrip essentially guaranteed me the status. I was pleasantly surprised by the upgrades as I wasn't expecting any at the lowest elite level, really just wanted to be able to select my seats and board early.

Based on my initial experience, I shifted travel to US and eventually made Gold. As my travel nowadays is primarily personal, I eventually fell back to Silver but was still impressed by the number of upgrades I received compared to a competitor where I have lifetime "lowest level" elite status.

I will admit that I was a little sad by the merger announcement, as it seemed like a "good thing" was coming to an end. I consider pmAA equivalent to the other large competitor relative to upgrades for the lowly elite. I suppose time will tell.

To wrap up, it was a wonderful ride US Airways! Thanks for the great times, even though it was only for a few years!!! ^

Mahalo Nui Loa

cedric

What started as a "good bye, US Airways" Facebook status turned into a 3800 word essay about how an airline - that I've never worked for - turned me into the person I am today. I'm not going to reproduce it here, but for a whole bunch of US memories, feel free to have a gander.

Here's an excerpt.

https://www.facebook.com/free.beer.t...53167638231129

The audience, of course, is my Facebook friends, but I think the bulk of the content will be of interest to this audience regardless.

mdaecher

Farewell my one-time close ally. You can be proud of maintaining one of the best hub airports -even after finding other girls that were better dance partners, I was always still fond of CLT

CPRich

The website is gone, the name retired to history (though I'll remember it when using my GOM miles next summer to Australia). My only remaining question - what do I do with these?



Triple Play promo, circa 1993
And yes, that is Continental Currency in the background. SPG50 paper certs. WN drink coupons - all kinds of stuff buried in my travel wallet.

BWISkyGuy

I just found an empty book of those in my collection last week, CPRich. I can still remember stopping in at the US CTO on California St. in SF to pick up more upgrade books as needed so I wouldn't have to mess with buying them at the airport when I was in a hurry.

The Pacer reference on there is funny... It's hard to believe Pacer was four reservation systems ago now (counting the two different Sabre iterations separately since they are different).

Flight62, thank you for sharing that heartfelt message. I came to US through Piedmont and flew them religiously through 2008. Times were not always good, but there were some things US did really well (especially in the Wolf makeover). No matter what shape the product was in, though, it was always the wonderful people who kept me coming back. Even some of the gruff ones, who you got to know better and better the more you flew with them, worked their way into your heart.

Each generation of the company had aspects that I remember fondly, even if it was never Piedmont again. The HP-style product eventually drove me off frustrated, but even in that generation I have to respect its stability, something the company hadn't seen much of since the '87/'89 mergers.

...And now it's off to the giant Aladdin tray in the sky.

bkafrick

Ha - this was the best promo ever. The fact that Baton Rouge was in the "west" was great. It counted twice (new destination, and west zone). I flew a 16-hour run that day SYR>BOS>DCA>CLT>BTR>CLT>SYR to get east, west, shuttle, and new location. Cost was around $600. I think you needed one of each of those bumped up one elite class. I was bumped from Gold to Platnium, and for the first time, actually felt like I was out of the "cattle" of US Gold. Well worth the $600 HSJ-run.

I miss the third tier our of four within USDM. Now I feel like cattle again in AA Platinum.

cessnadriver

Like many folks on this board, I spend just about every week on the road with 99% of my flying on US. After the merger was announced, I was actually a bit upset and not sure what to expect. On the surface, my feelings were completely irrational. After all, I go to the local grocery store every week; I didn’t have any attachment to them during their last merger. I didn’t really understand it until about 6 months ago when I was traveling with my family on a leisure trip. A flight attendant who recognized me (and knew me by name) stopped by to thank me for my business over the years and said that frequent passengers and staff are almost a 2nd family to one another at times. Her delivery was sincere and touching. In many ways, the career and numerous opportunities I’ve been fortunate to have over the years have been enabled in part by US. Here’s to the future and many new memories.

In no particular order, here’s my list of top US Airways Memories:

#1 Former Piedmont Employees
#2 My home airport being served exclusively by a mix of 737’s and Fokker 100s
#3 Paper tickets, upgrade coupons, and the variety of ticket jackets.
#4 The old-school fabric covered recliners on the 767
#5 Thinking how classy the 1996 US Airways grey/blue branding and livery looked.
#6 Being on the first revenue flight of a brand new A320 (circa 1998)
#7 Thinking Silver status when I was 20 years old was awesome (and still managing a near 100% upgrade rate)
#8 Express flights out of the bottom level of D.
#9 Going to college in Raleigh at during the GoFares days and price war with SWA ($19 r/t lunch run to Philly, $79 transcons to SEA and LAS)
#10 My first flight on HP metal post AWA merger (8F 737 cabin with no bulkhead at 1L)
#11 For a time, being Atlanta-based and my coworkers not understanding why I wouldn’t just take direct flights on Delta.
#12 My routine, weekly commute for nearly two years.
#13 The row 1 mini-cabin on the 330 prior to the suites
#14 Landing some awesome award bookings (i.e. XXX-CLT-ORD-FRA-BKK-SYD-BKK-ICN-JFK-CLT-XXX in Int’l F for 110K miles per person). If I think about the equivalent cash cost over the years, it’s insane.
#15 Once in Europe on Christmas Eve and having my LH flight to FRA cancel, Chairman’s managed to reticket me to MUC and snagged me the last Envoy seat home to PHL
#16 The CLT Club and bar staff
#17 Being far away and having trouble getting home due to IRROPS and hearing the familiar NC accent of someone at Chairmans who would always go the extra mile to help. The feeling when they'd come back from placing you on hold to check on something, and you could immediately tell by the tone of their voice that they were able to help out or fix the problem.
#18 Star Alliance Partners
#19 Coming back home from international trips and looking forward to seeing the familiar US Airways livery
#20 On a mainline flight to CLT about a year or so ago, a former Piedmont pilot was commuting to his final trip. I briefly went back to thank him for all of his service getting me and millions of other passengers to their destinations safely over the years. He was very humble and thanked me for giving him the chance to “live out his boyhood dream”. I returned to my seat with an even greater respect for the US team and a tear in my eye.

CPRich

- Salad and Sundae carts in F
- Mary at the SFO club - 27 months of PIT-SFO weekly, and saw her almost every week. As nice and helpful as she could possibly be.
- Getting out More (300K extra miles that year)
- Flying to some tiny NY airport from BOS, then getting back on 20 minutes later, to get bumped up to CP rather than dropping to SLV for the next year (probably the same promo mentioned above.) I think it's the only real mileage run I've ever taken
- My first and only Envoy flight - PIT-CDG for a weekend ski trip to Val d'Isere (MsCP was already there on business). The only CP cert I ever redeemed
- The new PIT airport, built just for US. MsCP was on the first flight in - redeye from SFO. (and the subsequent abandonment by US)
- Watching the Simpsons at 8p on Sunday, and still getting to MHT that evening. I.e. - real flights after 7pm
- 1st year at CP - it was new and novel and rare, and I was treated very well
- Arriving at EWR for my connection to BTV and finding there were three stops on the way, in a 20-ish seat puddle-jumper. and the 8 minute PBG-BTV final leg, seeing the landing lights just after takeoff.
- First scheduled US flight on the new E70. Stopping at the club and asking for an exit row seat, followed by several minutes to determine there was no exit row.
- ANA award finder, and having the US agents ask me what to do next "because you obviously have better information than I do".
- BusinessReject

LPDAL

I grew up mostly flying Delta and AA from FLL and MIA, respectively. Delta uses T2 in FLL, of which the west - facing windows inside faced all of the US Airways gates and action. I always loved the look of both the standard US Airways livery but especially loved the colorful heritage and Star Alliance schemes that would occasionally visit as well. One time before flying FLL-ATL for the ten millionth instance, I asked my dad why we did not fly on US Airways, to which he replied that he is loyal to Delta. Another trip, exasperated, he said I could fly US Airways when I paid for my own tickets.

I turned 18 in November 2013, and in May 2014, I found an A330 on PHL-MCO with the Envoy suites. Seizing the moment, I plopped down $600 to fly FLL-PHL-MCO-MIA during the second to last weekend of my junior year in high school.

Goodbye, US Airways: Envoy Suites First Class Farewell Flight FLL-PHL-MCO | Trip Reports Forum | FlyerTalk

American Airlines 757-200 Lie flat Flagship Intrafloridian Business Class MCO-MIA | Trip Reports Forum | FlyerTalk


Later, my parents and I went to go visit my dad's second youngest brother in Tampa. However, instead of flying with them on the boring WN FLL-TPA-FLL route, I jaunted 20 miles south and rode the then new MIA-TPA-MIA route on US (this route was flown by PMAA along with MIA-MCO-MIA but for whatever reason US aircraft were placed on this route as well).

American Airlines First Class, US Airways First Class, Baptism Ceremony MIA✈TPA✈MIA | Trip Reports Forum | FlyerTalk


My very last trip on US Airways was last Christmas Break in December of 2014. Originally, my family was going to visit the same relatives for Christmas, but they called off the gathering at the last moment. This trip turned out to be a complete disaster in the beginning because my Nikon DSLR D5200 was stolen in the Concourse E security checkpoint in MIA, only to be returned to me with the help of Detective Kaufman of the Miami Dade Airport Police:

US Airways First Class+TPA Marriott Hotel, Stolen DSLR→Christmas Miracle MIA✈TPA✈MIA | Trip Reports Forum | FlyerTalk


-LPDAL

KevinMenoJetBlueVirginAmericafan

Did AA start repainting the A320-214s powered by CFM to new AA livery?

grahampros

Perhaps i'm jaded with airline mergers by this point but i'm glad it's now officially over. There was too much to figure out on who I was booked on on how it was going to go on day of travel. So glad it's now all one airline with the same processes . No one in the business should be surprised by it with all the "legay" stuff. You have already worked for at least 3 companies. you roll with it.

SeeBuyFly

Ah, nostalgia. My wife was booked on US427, the flight that crashed outside PIT in 1994. It was the first leg of a money-saving one-stop to the east coast. After a while the travel agent found space on a nonstop and changed the ticket (in those days that could be done). When the US plane crashed, she was in the air on an AA flight.

Neither of us flew them again, so I believe I still have some drink coupons tucked into the US folder of my file cabinet (yes, we had paper statements in those days, and I would file them). I wonder if they are still usable; they have no expiration date on them.

LtKernelPanic

Kinda sad to see them go. I took my first flight on a US CR9 from DSM to PHX back in 2006 and flew a handful of other flights on them over the years as well. Probably one of the best flights I've ever had was a flight from Omaha to Phoenix on a CR9 (of all planes) sitting in 2A last February. The FAs were amazing.


After seeing this thread I remembered snapping a picture of the CR9 I took from DSM to PHX while we were waiting for maintenance to check one of the engines which was NOT something I wanted to hear as a first time flyer!



I had my DSLR with me but remember not wanting to get yelled at for taking pictures of the plane so I used my crappy cell phone camera instead. Wish I had used the DSLR so I could read the tail number of the plane.

LPDAL

I was wondering if local airport authorities ever yell out "Hey everyone! They're merging again! Get ready to remove more airline signage!"

-LPDAL

CMK10

I was flying AA yesterday from RDU-LGA. I got to the RDU AC and noticed the agent working had a US Airways Club notepad. I asked if I could have it and told her I collected airline memorbillia. She said, perhaps you'd like this instead and gave me this:



She's a longtime PI and US Employee who has a stash of the good old stuff at home and brings it to work.