First Flight
 

Just out of curosity... does anyone remember their first airline flight?

I was about 10 or so, and flew AA from BNA to CLE on a Lockheed Electra, stopping in Louisville, CVG, CMH and CLE, visiting my grandparents....

I remember it well, because we were flying along a warm front and never flew very high.. in the clouds the whole time. Very turbulent.... "man I had a dreadful flight... the paper sack was on my knee..." (apoligies to the Beatles - Paul McCartney's back-up band before he started Wings.....)

I'm not sure if this one was my first or not, but I only remember it because I have pictures. I was 7 and flew to grandma and grandpa's new home in Florida for the summer by myself.

I was less than a year old, but apparently it was a South African Airways flight from Chicago to Johannesburg.


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"I just wanna wish you good luck, we're all counting on you"
-Dr. Rumack

My first flight was aa171 (i think that was the number) a md80 flying lga-ord.This occured on march 15th,2001 when i was 17.Amazing how many miles ive flown to make up for my yrs of not flying
-howie

Right after I graduated from high school. I flew to Palm Beach to go stay with my aunt for a couple weeks in Jupiter. I am pretty sure I flew out of DCA ... well, it had to be DCA because I know it wasn't IAD and BWI wasn't very popular at the time http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

It believe the flights were on Eastern Airlines but I don't recall anything about either flight.

[This message has been edited by tazi (edited 01-15-2003).]

I was ?18 and flew on Eastern Airlines (remember them?) into Orlando. The jet landing strip was at the McCoy AFB, hence the code for Orlando continues as MCO. All I remember was that it smelled of jet fuel.

BTW I've also flown on Ozark, North Central, Midway and several others who have gone.

Recently, in addition to an NWA Gold schedule for many years, I've flown on United, Delta, American & Continental. I wonder how many of the latter 4 will see 2004? As the Enya song ends, Who knows - only time!

I don´t know which age I was(3-4 years) when I took my first flight on a Lockhead Tristar from DUS-Las Palmas with LTU

I was 20 and boarded a BA 747 LAX-London (don't remember if it was LHR or GTW.) Travelling with our college Concert Choir. We were allowed to see the cockpit, during the flight, after serenading the flight crew and passengers.

The funny thing I remember is that there was a group of high school students on the plane. Since alcohol was free (and free-flowing) they were all drunk to the point of passing out on the floor. The funny part was watching them wake up!


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Bob

I was 14 and flew a National Airlines DC-6B from PHL to MIA with my parents. (We also flew back.)

My first flight was in 1980 looking at the Univ. of TX & it was too far to drive. My first flight segment was MBS-DTW on Republic. (absorbed by NW). My life has not been the same ever since! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif Now I enjoy flying & seeing new places!

I sure as hell don't remember my first flight, but it was TXL-XXX-LAX, and I must have been about 4 1/2 weeks old, as there are pictures of me sitting in LA at about 5 weeks.
Any FTer younger on his/her first flight?

[This message has been edited by Pacha (edited 01-15-2003).]

Not too clear on the flight details, but dinner
was fried chicken (leg, thigh, wing), mashed
taters and gravy, peas, and fruit cocktail
for afters. I had milk, probably the only time
I actually asked for milk on an airplane.
It was also my first fried chicken and my
first mashed taters and gravy.

Major turbulence (or so it seemed to me), and
it was the first and only time I actually urped
on a plane. The first thing to come up was the
maraschino cherry from the fruit cup. For decades
after I was afraid not of airplanes nor of
turbulence but of maraschino cherries.

This was on a DC-6 from Cincy (before it became
CVG) to Washington (before it became Ronrico and
possibly before it became National).

I was in the last row, left side window.
My mother and my infant sister were next
to me. I was 3 at the time.

I was 19 years old (1965) and flew ORF-DCA. When I made the reservation they asked if it was for Y or F. I asked how much F was and it was only 25% more (I think) so I took F. Spoiled me for life.

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gfowler-ord-1k
Living in SIN

The first flight that I remember was around age 7 from Spokane to PDX. I traveled by myself as a UM. I think it was a United or Western flight. I remember getting groovy wings and all the ginger ale I could stand.

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" You! Out of the gene pool!! " -- bumpersnicker

My first flight was a business trip 3 years ago. Fortunately, I was with a coworker that introduced me to activities such as airport parking, checking in luggage, etc. Otherwise, I would have been lost and may have never made it on the plane.

Another coworker who had a Red Carpet Club membership flew with us on the return trip, so I got to hang out in the lounge during a layover.

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Kickback King

The first flight I remember (though not the first one I took) was in December of 1977 (I was 8). Flying Burbank (CA - outside LA) to Seattle on Continental to spend Christmas with my uncle's family.

Evidently, everyone else wanted to fly on that flight, so Continental went for broke in freeing up the five seats our family had by paying for:

1) A taxi to LAX,
2) $400 "cash" compensation (as in they sent us a check, not a flight credit),
3) First Class on United from LAX to SEA (been a United and First Class fan ever since) for all five of us,
4) A taxi from SEA to my uncle's place, which is about 60 minutes away.

And we were travelling on a "cheap" ticket (these were the days before deregulation, so I am sure even "cheap" was expensive)...

I was 6, it was a Caravelle from FRA to Mallorca.

I would have flown from Florida to Chicago with my mother sometime during my first nine months of life... for the life of me, however, I don't know the details.

I think it is in my baby book, however, so I will have to e-mail my dear mother and ask her!

SGN to SEA Dec 17, 1970

Aged 11

Cambrian Airways flight number CS 513 Liverpool to Isle of Man. Vickers Viscount G-AMOO. 30 minute flighttime. Fare £3:18:0 each way.

Later in life came the first plane I skydived out of, the first one I handled myself, and my first solo (which is a bigger moment than getting your licence).

So as you can see, after that first flight I was hooked!

San Francisco to Boston in 1969 on TWA (so I was about 8).

My father was transferred to his company's HQ outside of Boston for a year. This was the first flight for my three brothers and me - our ages ranged from 5 to 10 and my parents still remembered the flight years later. http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/wink.gif

When we moved back to California after my father's assignment, we spent three weeks driving and camping across the country - I'm not sure why my parents decided not to fly! http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/biggrin.gif

Late 1960's on PSA (Pacific Southwest Airways) for a Disneyland/Sealand, etc... trip. I think we flew SFO-SNA on a L-188 Electra. Got me some wings and I think a junior pilot certificate.

I was around 8 years old and flew with my folks ORD-MIA on a late night flight on a 747. The plane was very empty and I ran up and down the aisles a lot.

Up to that time, the only kind of sandwiches I would eat were PB&J. Of course, the didn't have PB&Js on the plane, but they did have ham and cheese. So I tried one and liked it, and allowed my mother to make them for me subsequently.

Perhaps one of the few times airplane food has expanded someone's food preferences.

I remember my first flight; I think I was 5, but I remember my second flight even better because it didn't happen. My mother heard it was raining somewhere nearby, like Mexico, and we had to take the train back from Florida.

I was 6 weeks old, flying from Germany with my mother to the Middle East where my father was managing an extended project at the time. Not even sure this is legal nowadays at that age, but this was in the 70's..
I believe the carriers were Lufthansa and Libyan Arab Airways.

[This message has been edited by JohnG (edited 01-18-2003).]

I was one year old, flying from ARN via CPH to DUS - first leg was SAS and seconf was LH. Not that I possibly can remember - however I still have the ticket - cost was a staggering $ 8.05 http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/smile.gif

Cheers

Thomas

GVA-ATH-BKK-SEL in 1971, with the first leg on a Swissair DC8, I was told (18 months old at the time).

My first flight I can remember was MAD-GVA on an Iberia DC8 in the mid-seventies.

The first I remember was some North Central CV580 flight in or out of Chicago - I would have been about 5 ish, but I was apparently flying prior to that, mostly on Northwest Orient

My first flight was when I was 7, from Sydney to Cairns (CNS) on TAA (Trans-Australian Airlines which subsequently became Australian Airlines and then was swallowed up into Qantas). I remember that we had to stop at Brisbane on the way up and we used the back steps in the 727. Unfortunately our bags didn't complete the journey with us and came the next day. My brother and I got the junior flight bag or whatever. We also got two trips up to the cockpit for the two legs of the trip. I was hooked from that moment.

July, 1958. TWA #804, IDL-ORY (New York, Idlewild -now Kennedy- to Paris, Orly, for those of you too young to remember.)

N7101C; Lockheed Super "G" Constellation.

I was almost eight.

It was also my mothers' first flight. She had talked Dad into going to see the relatives in Italy and booked steamship tickets. He said he didn't have time to go by ship, fly or forget it. We flew.

Dad had to come home before we did. We were still booked on a ship coming home. Three days before we were to leave Italy she cashed in the boat tickets and booked us back on TWA. She never set foot on another ship or train for almost forty years.

Fly or forget it. I agreed with that for a long time.

In July of 1975 on a TWA 727 from STL to MSP. Followed the same day by a Chartered DC-10 to a Norwegian Air Force base for the Boy Scout World Jamboree in Lillehammer.

Seems I'm the late bloomer: I was around 14 when we flew STR-DBV (Stuttgart, Germany to Dubrovnik, former Yugoslavia) on Inex Adria Airlines... And after that: zero flights for another 4 or 5 years...

I believe that my first flight was Boston to Bermuda (I don't recall the routing or flight numbers, or even the carrier) some time in 1982.

7 Yrs old, ~1974. Western Airlines B737 for a trip to Disneyland. Flew the milk run YEG-YYC-GTF-SLC-LAX and return the same way. Don't remember much about the flight itself other than throwing up in the terminal at LAX after we arrived.

I remember my older kid's first FF award, which is sort of the same thing.

It was back in the old days when the airlines hadn't figured things out.

We accumulated miles for the kid as an infant on 10% international fares -- and then cashed them in when he passed two years old for a free child's ticket.

No wonder Pan Am went bankrupt!!

Alaska Airlines, 727, ANC-SEA, redeye, "Golden Nugget Service", January 1967, en route to basic training.

My first trip was not too interesting: 1980 interviewing at schools. BOS-ORD-SAN (UA--channel 9 even then), LAX-SFO (UA), SFO-BOS (TWA). UA flights on 737's, TWA on a L-1011 (I think).

My daughter's first trip was more memorable. 1991, 1 day old, SAN-SEA (AS) on a MD-80. As new, and a bit surprised parents we were thankful she slept almost the entire way. She still enjoys flying, though now she wants to be awake and in front!

November 1967 on a United Boeing 707, Portland to JFK, first class at age 7 with my parents and younger sister. I think it was overnight. I remember having a sandwich on the plane and then having to use the little bag when we went through turbulence.

A classmate of Law Lord Sr. was a manager at the Waldorf-Astoria, so we were upgraded to a suite -- a LARGE suite maybe 20-25 floors up. I found out on next year's trip (coach, motel rooms, two sisters) not to expect this treatment again on Dad's nickel.

That spoiled me for travel, though it would be 20 years and maybe 50,000 miles before I would again be in first class.

United gave us children's entertainment kits: coloring book, crayons, "Junior Pilot" gold wings for me, and "Junior Stewardess" gold wings for my sister.