was at least one open, not that it matters

no offense, it certainly cost a lot for something that ended up not perfect. while it certainly could have gone much better, and while my pictures didn’t come out, I certainly did see almost the entirety of the sun blocked by the moon using my eyes. But it certainly took a lot of craning of the neck. I expected straight line then reverse instead of all the turning which was unfortunate.

Maybe think of it at as like sitting in the front row of opening day of a movie; subpar viewing but fun energy. Did it work out as hoped? No. Was it unique? Yes. Would I do it again? No. But I think posters classifying it as a gimmick (which is what I thought at first as well) is doing a disservice to what was clearly a lot of work that didn’t go as well as hoped.

DM sent. Thank you.

How was the proposal on DL1010?

(Assuming you mean 1218) It was pretty cool. Lots of media attention. I don’t recall when it happened, but pretty sure it wasn’t during totality. Here’s one of the stories from it.
https://www.cbsnews.com/amp/news/del...om-30000-feet/

News articles
 

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...t-reviews.html
https://www.businessinsider.com/pass...ent-mad-2024-4
https://www.washingtonpost.com/trave...-flight-delta/

All seem to say similar things, flights did not really see totality but it was a very interesting experience.

DL1218 definitely saw totality from both sides of the aircraft. Here’s a fun photo (not my own) that shows the reflection of totality on the wing.
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...60b5dfe16.jpeg

Beautiful pics, Scotttheking! Thanks for sharing.

Cpm013, the problem with those news articles is that it’s not “the angle was tough”, the problem was 1010 flew OUT of totality zone!

The more you look into DL1010, the more frustrating it gets. It was at exactly ONE minute before totality, DL1010, which WAS on the path of totality the whole time (though at the southern edge), made a right turn & exited the totality path. (Having seen totality from a plane before, it’s truly a life changing experience. Just ask those on the Austin flight, DL1218, who got a view 100,000 times darker than us, according to Scott Kelly’s speech at DTW when he said totality is 100kx darker than 99%, of course he didn’t know 1010 only got 99%!)

Here’s the track: https://fr24.com/data/flights/dl1010#34b04339 it was because of this right turn at 1:54pm CDT (1min before totality), the whole plane missed totality. We were over Jonesboro, AR(southern edge of totality, but still in the path had we not turned). Totality hits Jonesboro at exactly 18:55UTC. As you can see, at exactly 18:54UTC, we turned in the one direction not to go if over Jonesboro - south! Had we turned left (north), there would’ve been plenty of time to do another right 180 as we’d be flying closer to the center of the zone. Even if we went straight along the filed routing of ZACHH4 BSKAT LIT J131 PXV WWODD HANBL3, we would’ve still seen totality (even if it’d be tough to look at the eclipsed Sun).

In fact…
Compare to FR24 track to a high res eclipse map. Almost the entire flight (other than descent) was in the path of totality. The ONLY time we weren’t in totality path was exactly when totality hit. In other words, the whole time we were at the right place at the wrong time, when the right time came, it was the few minutes we turned towards the wrong place. For some reason the pilot likely thought that we were in the center of the eclipse path. (I checked the weather, and liveatc audio, there was no reason, such as thunderstorms or restricted airspace, that required the right turn towards Memphis. In fact, everyone else - DL1218 and various other flights, were having a good time inside totality on our left)

Saddest thing is if I had missed the flight, DFW’s clouds cleared just in time for totality there. Months ago I also bought a nonrefundable ticket on another flight with a LCC that I didn’t get on since that wasn’t an eclipse dedicated flight. That one ended up through the center of totality!
https://cimg5.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...9dcbe24e7.jpeg
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/www.fly...7d3d6c754.jpeg

i am glad that you have the same observation and conclusion as I had. While I am happy for my fellow passengers sitting on the left side of the DL1010 plane got a far better solar eclipse view and experience than people sitting on the right side; Delta should had done a better manuever decision to get this plane to be into the path of totality when the solar eclipse intercepted the plane by dojng the following:

1) to go along with the direction of the path to extend the timing of the passengers' totality experience instead of going against by going into a full circle that shortened the experience of the solar eclipse

2) to have both sides to enjoyed the totality darkness by swinging a S (instead of circle) within the path to provide almost equal experience for both sides

While we understand delta has stated that even the solar eclipse designed flight might not necessarily have all the perfect experience but they promised in their PR press release that this flight should have increased duration of solar eclipse...and that they hype so much about the experience from PR with news media.

It is like going to a taylor swift concert. Everyone understands that maybe taytay might not has her best day to sing at the day of concert. but the organizer should design and arrange the audio speakers in the staidum so that everyone in the stadium who bought the tickets should able to hear almost exactly the same quality of what taytay sang.

Right now, the experience of passengers who sat at april 8th dl1010 flight is like having half of the audience at a taytay concern can hear taytay sang but the other half couldn't 'even hear a single word of whatever taytay sang. That's like a classical case of potential classaction lawsuit for anyone sitting at the right side of dl1010.

I was also in DL1010 and I was seated on the right side as well. This is the timeline of the maneuver comparison between DL1010 and DL1218 at the time of totality. It appears that you and Eclipse2026 are correct that Delta made a mistake by making an incorrect turn to go outside of the eclipse. What maddening. Anyone know why Delta did that?

youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=I0sN1zmvhoU

Did Delta decide to turn or did Memphis ATC tell them to turn?

That's a great question. There is a reddit group that one of the other passengers is contacting the Memphsis Air Traffic Control for the details that are happening from between 1830 to 1900 UTC

Oddly enough, the clip from liveatc.net is cut fown to only from 1830 to 1847. From between 1847 to 1900, which the solar eclipse was happening a d that 13 minutes segment in the area is trimmed off from the website.

Maybe someone should FOIA the info. This seems strange.

Liveatc.net and search KMEM

Delta 1010’s pilot decided to turn. I’m still searching for the exact ATC sector on liveatc (did find it for 1218, but not 1010 yet), however in one of the pilot announcements he did say that he was going to ask for the turn (that was the OH $HIT moment for me, knowing we were already near the southern boundary.)

update: here’s a video with the PA at 6:03
https://youtu.be/AVDp5ugAXHo?si=Ok-NpMbU09p-50dj

Thank you Eclipse2026 and glpcs. I just got a respond back from delta, they claimed it was air traffic controller that directed them for the term. Below is delta's official response to me. I did recall it was the pilot who made an announcement that he would ask ATC for the right turn.

"Thank you for contacting us regarding your recent travel experience on Delta Air Lines Flight 1010, on April 08, 2024, from Dallas Fort Worth to Detroit.

Flying with Delta should be enjoyable and I am sorry the inability to view the eclipse caused your experience to be otherwise. We wanted this to be a memorable occasion and we are sorry you felt robbed of the experience. In this instance we could not make any guarantee that a passenger would have a particular view of the eclipse for any length of time. The pilot must adhere to the instructions coming from the Air Traffic Controllers and do not choose the route they take.

When there is a controllable service failure on Delta's behalf and our passengers are inconvenienced in any way, we do our best to make things right. Please know, it was never our intention to make you feel as if you were part of an experiment"

Did they offer anything in return for not being able to have the promised experience?

Hi Cpm013, Delta didn't offer anything in return—compensation or whatever—other than just written words of apology. Even I stated that the premium amount of money or miles that they charge for this special flight should carry a weight of planning and execution with the most proper due diligence. They completely asserted, based on Delta's quote below, that everything that happened to explain why they missed the totality at DL1010 was 100% out of Delta's control due to ATC. Inferentially, they claimed that they had planned and carried out their actions in accordance with the best limit that ATC had set.

Looking into the comments from other forums outside of flyertalk related to DL1010,

youtube.com/watch?v=I0sN1zmvhoU&t=1s
reddit.com/r/space/comments/1c0wf6c/delta_eclipse_flight_dl1010_makes_wrong_turn/?onetap_auto=true

It seems Delta has pre-planned the path and asked the ATC for approval of the flight path rather than ATC demanded that Delta DL1010 to do whatever they actually did. So if that's the case, then Delta didn't do proper due diligence on planning, executed a route that was poorly planned for its purpose, and failed to ask ATC to go for alternative transportation since the totality is on the west side of the plane.