GavinHogan

rog747

Ah that would make sense then with the 30 J seats as seen on my booking/Res seat plan
(an ex SQ A330-300 with 30J and 255Y just arrived at Evelop)

I have row 1A and C for 30 JUL 11.25 am ex JFK and they have seemingly been protected.

Hopefully this will be a nice flight then

paulb606

Hi all

Thanks for the info so far. I have never flown Norwegian and was looking forward to checking out the experience on the 737-Max. I had booked an exit seat and was curious what transl atlantic travel was like in a narrow body plane with no entertainment.
I thought once the planes were grounded the Norwegian 787 models would be brought in to replace them. I have received an email today saying that it is now Evelop Air on an A330. Unfortunately if I had of known this at the time of booking I would have spent the extra €200 for an Aer Lingus flight.

Anyway.....I have since re booked with Norwegian an exit seat on this Evelop Air A330 (Seat 33A) - I'm flying Dublin - Stewart at the end of July.

What I would love to know is how comfortable these exit seats on Evelop Air are?? I'm 6'1 and big boned you could say Are they suitable for larger people?
Sitting in the exit row on the Norwegian 737-Max would not have been an issue as I have sat in similar on Ryanair and other European airlines.

Many Thanks for any help.

NJRadioGuy

I'm flying on that route tonight and will give a trip report as time and wifi allows. I'm booked in 1D from SWF to DUB (it's an all-Y config, so every seat should presumably be the same, in theory), and while I'm not quite as tall as you, I'm probably heavier and wider. Personally I wasn't looking forward to the MAX-8, but for the ultra low sale price I paid ($266 return, back in late March) I wasn't about to complain. For comparison's sake, I've flown EWR<>SEA in coach on a 737-800 (NG) on Alaska. Despite the decent service, the thin/narrow seats were just miserable after about hour three, and that trip cost 3x what this one did! It's about as long from SEA to EWR as it will be from SWF to DUB (add more time coming back, though), so I think the comparison is valid.

They've been using EC-MII on this route, and the seat map on Evelop's site doesn't match D8's seat map, so who knows what's going on. All I can say is there's going to be an awful lot of people in that plane, and I sure wouldn't want to be the last one off, knowing there were over 400 people from your flight alone in front of you, all racing for customs and immigration, along with the rest of the trans-Atlantic fleet. This is why my original plan was to go into Shannon on the MAX. Fewer people, smaller airport, closer to my destination, etc. But again, for the price, it's more a case of grin-and-bear-it than anything else.

paulb606

rog747

The issue with many exit row seats (especially on wide body jets at the big door exits) is that they can be narrower and the tray tables are in the arm rests meaning hip width is restricted - That is often the trade off versus the legroom.

A320 and 737 over wing exit seats do not usually have this problem

Phrastus

I hope these flights are at least bearable for folks. Every time I open this thread, I misread the outbound airport code and go, "Wow they're flying A330 from Sacramento to Ireland? THAT is a long flight."

rog747

The A330 is a decent long haul plane - Y seating is normally a more pleasant 2-4-2 (Air Transat have a 3-3-3 on some of theirs)

Evelop seem to have a reasonable feedback when operating for others -
They have an all Y config on the Irish routes for DY,
plus another a/c with 30C and 255Y which Norwegian are leasing for the LGW-JFK am flight.

A Y seat in the rows of 2 on the side of an A330 is likely more appealing crossing the pond than being on a 737.

NJRadioGuy

OK, so here's the lowdown. I just got back last night and I wanted to give a good report from a computer with a real keyboard, rather than from my phone when I was over there. Luggage weight restrictions meant the laptop was a casualty of D8's 10kg restriction. So here goes.

The good: It's a new aircraft and the ride both ways was extremely smooth. Didn't feel rickety or give off the chewing-gum-and-bailing-wire feel I've had on other charter type airplanes.
The not so good:

• No WiFi.
• Extremely limited and quite dated IFE options
• The moving map was 1980s-level rudimentary, and only updated every 4 or 5 minutes, it seemed.
• No blankets.
• No pillows.
• No flight deck announcements other than "cabin crew prepare for takeoff/approach/landing." Nothing else. No updates on destination WX or ETA. Not even a message with the local time at arrival.
• 2-4-2 config was OK, but bulkhead seats were indeed narrower. Seat pitch narrow and cusions unconfortable after 4-5 hours for anybody with bigger proportions. More on the seats in a bit.

One big issue for me on these two flights were the Spanish speaking FAs, While nice people and competent, they spoke almost no English at all, and had trouble reading the announcements off their iPads (I was watching this happen from 1D on the way over and 1C on the way back). While annoying when trying to order a snack—she understood the words "coffee" and "tea" but had no idea how to say the words describing the snack options on the cart she was serving from—this might be far more of a problem if their safety skills were required. Their heavily-accented English was virtually impossible to understand in the usual inflight messages, but if Something Happened that required detailed instructions to passengers, that could be problematic on this route. It would be understandable when ferrying Spanish speaking passengers to and from BCN or MAD, but when serving on a route from one unilingual-English speaking nation to another, it is an issue. There were a total of 9 FAs on the flight, based in two stations; 5 up-front and 4 amidships. Two of them were actual D8 employees, and seven were Evelop crew. The flight deck crew was Evelop.

Seat specifics. 1D over. 1D and 1H, on paper, look great. At SWF you board from door L1, I sat down and could stretch my feet out no problem. I thought I had scored the best seat on the airplane. Well...no. After takeoff, the FAs close off the curtain between their compartment between the flight deck and the cabin, and keep the florescent lights on the whole time. So a thin sliver of bright white light shines out RIGHT IN YOUR FACE from the slit between the curtain and bulkhead. What's more, the compartment for their luggage is behind the 1C bulkhead, so first row port side pax will constantly find the FAs going into that compartment to access their luggage. The noise from the service prep is annoying, but that's to be expected, I guess, but what was NOT expected was the fact they didn't shut up the entire flight, from takeoff to landing, they were talking--LOUDLY--amongst themselves. It appeared to be the same in the section between rows 12 and 13 from what I could tell on my few walks back to stretch my legs. On the day return flight this wasn't so bad, but on an overnight flight where everybody was trying to sleep it was VERY annoying.

I would say there were a total of 8 good seats on this entire flight. 12 A/B, 12 H/J (or whatever the starboard pair are called), and 33 A/B H/J. Unlimited legroom, no loud FAs or light beams in your face. I didn't get a good look at the over-wing exit seats so no comment there.

Note that in Dublin, you board/disembark through L2, not L1; the opposite from SWF.

I did not order a meal, and that was a good decision. What they served was a very small portion and definitely not worth $30 or whatever they were selling it for. Fill up before boarding and you'll be grand. They do offer beer and wine purchases, but here's the thing. They only made two passes through the cabin on the way over (first for meals, then for drinks, one immediately after the other, around 1.5 or 2 hours after T/O). Nothing for the rest of the flight. On the way back they made a third pass for snacks/drinks with about 2 hours left in the air. That was appreciated.

I would fly that aircraft again only if I could get row 12 or 33 left or right sides,or overwing exit rows, and only if I couldn't get a seat on a comparable mainstream airline within a couple of hundred dollars.I'm normally a Premium-economy traveler for longhaul (or at least more legroom or exit row seat), so this was an unpleasant experience for me. For what I paid, I guess it was acceptable, and if you're a smaller person who can fit in a regular seat you'll probably do well.

Hezu

I have to nitpick: flights between USA and Republic of Ireland are between unilingual and bilingual country. Of course, those Irish who have Gaelic as their first language almost certainly do understand also English.

NJRadioGuy

Yes, of course you're right, and I respectfully stand corrected. Considering Irish is placed above English on all of their road signs (and the county names on the license plates) I should have remembered that. And I did hear a fair bit of it in Connemara and Galway last week. But I believe the point about them not understanding or speaking English fluently still stands. Whether or not they can understand my snack order is a minor nit-pick. Not understanding them trying to guide pax to safety after an accident a bit more of a problem.

Jkerimac

NJRadioGuy

Which makes sense if you booked to/from Dublin before the equipment change. In my case, I was booked to and from Shannon.

Dan Hodson

New poster here, I've received an email yesterday advising that the Norwegian have subbed our Flight from LGW to JFK using Evelop, I appreciate there is another similar thread but that was for a different route.

I'm trying to establish which aircraft it will be subbed for, to figure out the best seats. i.e not too close to the toilets etc.

I'd added in a composite from the seat booking page on the Norwegian air seat booking page, but I'm not allowed to post it due to less than 5 posts

i.imgur.com/jNxdATu.jpg

GFrye