george77300

B2B very easy at MAD T4S. Especially with the usual longer turns. Shouldn't be an issue at all.

KARFA

never

also now in j out and back

george77300

Just hope you don't get a A319/320 swap.

I'm thinking of the 464/465 on 9th/11th August. Just worried to book and then they get changed because A350 not ready or something.

teledude

Use Avios - flexible then

KARFA

booked with avios so easily cancelled if necessary. i accept it is a bit speculative.

morges1

Unfortunately, I leave for HKG then SYD on 14 Aug, so may try to pair up with georges77300. Sorry, BotB, I just got back from holiday last evening and so can't do the DO (bugger!!!)

NB, G-XWBA went flying today. It had a lot of trips around the Bay of Biscay and popped over to Normandy and the Massif Central.

Will miss you all as this was going to be the key DO for me.

george77300

I'm based in Madrid so was looking at 465/464 anyway.

It's looking like BA465 on 9th August to LHR (in J) and then back to MAD BA464 (in Y or W ) on the Sunday 11th for me. May see a few of you. B2Bs also possible.

Spinstorm

I am finding this thread a bit confusing; If I want to try this new business class what flights should I book and what are we looking at in Avios?

george77300

You are looking at the above flights to Madrid on the above dates. It's 15,000 Avios for a Business flight.

Waterhorse

First Flight Today

First Flight
y

megaloman

Booked 10/8 on evening rotation in J.

BotB

Calendar for the MAD training flights (Caveat Emptor, some changes may still occur)

EDIT: For 6th Aug. onwards: Head for Points (HfP) has received some information from BA about the proposed dates and flights for the A350 training flights. The green calendar slots reflects only those that are CURRENTLY known to be A350 flights. (these may change for one or more reasons but this is what is planned or the seat map is now showing <3 days out at 11 AM> at least!) The 464/465 flights will be the main flights used to do the training and they are the last set of slots each day as these allow plenty of extra gate time in case of issues and also in case of any IRROPS (as they will then have plenty of time to do debriefings/modifications/changes or any other issues that come up and get it sorted in time for the next rotation. In addition to the evening rotation, BA has stated that some days they will also use the 456/457 run (first morning run) to use the A350 as well but has not published any dates, so it is truly a gamble and it may not repeat the week after so may be irregular, however, if you can't get on the evening rotation, try the first flights 456/457 and you may be lucky and get it then. The first morning rotation is the 8th Aug. (as previously planned) and I have added the 10th Aug. as the next 'likely' date the morning rotation is planned (according to the old schedule but this is not at all guaranteed so caveat emptor).

I have no direct connection to BA and therefore am not the source of the various schedule timings, please see the first post in this thread for the credit to those individuals. My contribution is simply to put the schedule into a calendar format and to facilitate any meet-ups FTers may wish to do when trying to arrange a flight on the A350 training flights.

Aug 2019:






The calendar is now at version 9 (above) and reflects the latest info from BA directly through third party websites news. I have removed the morning 456/457 runs from the calendar as BA went out of their way to say it would do some days using those flights but not stating when (and not stating it was regular each week either)...so only the above are currently planned (but may change as well still). The morning 456/457 runs were scheduled 3 x weekly in previous calendar versions but we'll wait to see what empirical data shows us before guessing if this remains true or if it is other dates/non-repeating days of the week, etc...BA has not mentioned any other flights though so if you want to try to fly the A350 on this route do pick the first or last BA flights on that day to have any chance of it happening. (note exceptions where no flights may occur in the calendar above). Seat maps are now starting to show the A350 3 days out.

For those people that have booked flights in Sept. it is now nearly certain that no training flights will occur in Sept. Please do not forget to cancel them or decide if you will fly them anyway, etc! I'm very sorry if you booked this previously and are now disappointed, however, you will realise that it was a risk and there were no guarantees it would occur. I hope you'll try to fly her on the Aug. schedule and get lucky.

I'll also start a list of who is going (and when) in the wiki for those that wish to publish their flights in this thread (or add it yourself to the wiki if you wish) to try and organise get togethers.

tynmar

BotB

Thank you for the kind words, however, it wasn't me that provided the initial flight rotations, that honour goes to another FTer (in the other A350 thread), I did guess it was going to be the 456 and 464 rotations based on previous gossip and the slot change at MAD for the 464 but I didn't know whether there would be one or two rotations a day and if (and when) any 'days off' were planned...so the post in the other thread helped greatly in this regard and all kudos goes to that person. I hope they do not get in trouble for posting the info so hence why I have not named anyone. (they can happily say if they are happy to be named and I'll edit my post in that case). It would have come out in the wash anyway given the amount of various actions going on, people involved and publicly available info anyway so hopefully this is not a big issue. What I have done is hopefully made the planning a bit easier on the eyes by putting it into calendar format for those looking to try and catch one of the flights. (I did this back with the A380 and 787 flights as well and it seemed to be well received then as now). ^

I would caution a word of advice that when the A380 'launched' the training flights, it was delayed a few days initially, so I'd view the 6th and 7th Aug. as very risky indeed in case of any delays or other factors keeping it from 'starting' the training runs...Friday the 8th Aug. is certainly safer as a gamble to get the first or one of the first flights...but again, all of this is at your own risk and without any liability or confirmation from BA to date.

Safe travels, hope to see some of you on one of the flights, I am trying to work out a date that both morges1 and myself can get still (with the flurry of avios bookings likely happening now!) to hold a revised DO date so watch this space in that regard....(paging @morges1 )

I have updated the wiki to include all the flights that I believe were posted in this thread so far (going to MAD in any case) and will update as people add their flights, (or you can do it yourself if you wish).

tynmar