I was trying to figure out where does AA get the BCN 772 from. Pretty much checked all of their 777 hubs and none of them have flights to CLT. Do they really think they can run CLT-MUC-CLT everyday using 1 772 frame rebased to CLT, with about 2 hours between each flight? Since the LHR flight arrives into CLT too late to continue to MUC, they can't really cycle that aircraft from/into other international routes.

And agreed, the timing seems to be brutal. Basically you are landing just before the normal bed time. I guess they are trying to separate it a bit from the later LH flight?

so a HNL-PHX 333 leg later this year will be change to something else?

It's an interesting choice to be sure but the Charlotte region is home to a very large number of Bavarian companies. And it is constantly growing. Plus a lot of international flights leave from MUC. For instance, one common route to India today from CLT is to go CLT-FRA-MUC-BLR. With this update I could one hop instead of two if I wanted to avoid the middle east carriers and an LHR hop ticket was too costly.

BMW is also nearby. My CLT-LHR flights were always jam packed. Will be interesting to see if this flight actually happens, though.

There seems to be a misconception that the CLT-MUC route for AA is new, but it isn't. This flight has been in place since the beginning of April 2019, replacing the PHL-MUC route that was operated by US for many years. The only thing new here is that the route will be operated with the 772 instead of the 332.

Unfortunately, since its move to CLT, this flight has always had a terrible schedule. It's never been clear to me why this is, as the PHL-MUC flight that it replaced had sane timing to allow for connections on both sides, with a departure from PHL around 6-7 PM and a departure from MUC around noon. The current schedule on CLT-MUC means that there's little chance for sleep on the eastbound sector, and the early departure for the westbound sector makes for a ridiculously early wakeup call in Munich. (I know from experience -- I've flown it many times!)

I'm also not happy about the move to the 772. I've always found the 332 a very comfortable ride in any of the three classes of service. It also seems to be the right plane size to run this route year-round.

Despite the negatives, we should be happy that the flight is coming back at all. MUC isn't an LHR or MAD or CDG, so I'm just happy to see the flight return this summer.

Exactly.

CLT-MUC has been around for a little while, and this is the exact same horrible schedule the flight had as before for all the reasons you mention.

I have a trip to MUC scheduled in the Fall and intentionally booked through DFW to avoid CLT and this flight's awful scheduling. Since DFW-MUC isn't coming back I changed it to DFW-FRA, I'll take the train down.

That’s likely, if PHX-HNL even resumes.

For some reason, the thread’s title was changed and it now it sounds more like AA is launching two new routes, even though I stated in the original post it’s a resumption.

In 2018 and 2019 I think the PHL-MUC flight left at 4 pm or so too, at least in the fall timeframe when I was looking at flights for Oktoberfest.

Ugh. I hope that. I book hnl-Phx because it’s overnight lie-flat.

Agreed on the awful scheduling of CLT-MUC and vice versa. Assuming DFW-MUC doesn't come back this summer (might already be confirmed), as a west coaster I'd have to be on the first (i.e. 6am) eastbound flight to CLT to make the connection onward to MUC. No thanks.

I know it's not directly related, but I have a trip scheduled at the end of August PHL-LHR that was recently changed from a 333 to a 788 which looks like they're officially pulling the 333 off of certain routes.

When the route was launched last year, CLT's FIS was bursting at its seems. Remember when the expanded facility was the designed in 1990s, the only flights needing the facility were the daily BA 777 to LGW, along with US 767 flights to LGW and FRA, along with a weekly flight or two to CUN/SXM/GCM/MBJ. That's it.

In addition to the expanded Latin America/Caribbean network CLT acquired over the years, CLT now had 8 European arrivals (not including DUB and the new AA MUC flight) on A330/340/350 aircraft that arrived within a certain time span. Arriving flights often have to hold passengers back at the gate because the FIS area is at capacity and can't process anyone else. Additionally, parking an widebody at the older, "low D" gates effectively blocks off the two gates on either side because of clearance issues.

When AA added the MUC flight, they simply scheduled the flight to operate when the FIS area/international gates wouldn't be as busy.

AA usually ran a couple European departures out of the B gates because there wasn't enough room on the D gates...I think gates B9-13 can handle A330s. I wonder if they can handle 777s as well.

Thanks for the insight. I can only imagine this must be the right answer. But those flight times are just horrible -- almost enough to make me want to take the connection through LHR!

I recall the CLT international arrivals area being much smaller about 10 years ago, and yet even after their expansion they still have trouble when they get a couple of widebodies arriving at the same time. This is one area where PHL is arguably better than CLT. (Of course I've never seen PHL's passport control/customs area fully staffed to take advantage of its enormous size, but that's a different topic...)

Within the last 10 years I think the only "expansion" that they performed was increased the number of baggage carousels to 4 in the FIS area, and maybe increase the number of immigration counters. The airport had planned to perform a D gate refurbishment project that would have also included a remodel of the FIS area, but sadly all non-funded CLT expansion projects have been postponed due to COVID-19. Future plans also call for several C gates to be converted into "swing" gates with a secure corridor connection to the FIS area.

Caught a glimpse of it at CLT yesterday. N761AJ has been in CLT for a couple weeks and they're training on it. The plane was towed to several gates, two in the B Concourse, two in the D Concourse so staff could train on parking it and servicing it. Looks great here I'll say that.

https://photos.smugmug.com/Travel/Fl...IMG_9312-L.jpg