Had an unusual (to say the least) boarding experience at LAS on Monday evening.

Arrived at the gate shortly before boarding commenced, the first boarding call was for Group 6. Went forward with group 1 boarding cards to be told that 'boarding is from the back on instruction from the captain'.
We assumed, therefore, that once group 6 had boarded it would revert to normal 1,2,3 etc but no - boarding calls were 6,5,4,3,2,1!

Door 1L was in use for boarding and as we were row 1 it didn't really cause us any inconvenience but any Gold/Silver travelling in WT must have been quite upset about this.

I quizzed one of the cabin crew and he was unaware of this and said that "it hadn't come from the flight deck".

Any thoughts, or similar experiences?

haha, "on instruction from the captain'." i guarantee the flight crew have absolutely no interest in how boarding is conducted and which order groups are called.

From memory the A350s have a high sensitivity to weight imbalance. I recall once being held back from disembarking for 30 minutes whilst they got some freight off, 'to avoid tipping'...

But planes tip back surely. you'd want weight at the front if balance was an issue, no?

I suspect this was a directive from the flight deck due to weight issues. However, it would have made far more sense to board "rows 51-59, 41-49" etc

Boarding groups in reverse is truly ridiculous !

Weight and balance was mentioned. However (and a little knowledge is dangerous) it would seem inadvisable to load people towards the back of the aircraft leaving the front empty.

That's also making an assumption that people's boarding groups and where they are sat are related - which isn't necessarily true in economy, surely?

groups 4 5 and 6 will all be sat in economy

There may be economy people in groups 1 2 and 3, but you will not have non economy people in 4 5 and 6

This is very odd, if there's a weight and balance issue, you don't want the back filled first so the plane can tip backwards? And if you want the back loaded first for some reason, then board strictly by seat row, as zone 6 pax could all be sat near the front of economy, and a lot of zone 4 pax in the back rows.

Why would you board the least "valuable" customers first?

There's certainly precedence for DISEMBARKING from the back, but that's mostly if the loaders start unloading from the front hold for whatever reason.

It can happen if the cleaning crews have done economy but not yet finished Club. Seen that a couple of times, LAX and DEL if I remember correctly.

i think there was a period early on when the new A320neos often had centre of gravity warnings at the end of the flight and everyone had to remain seated until some of the containers were offloaded from the rear cargo hold. after some software updates that seems to be much less prevalent.

otherwise i haven encountered myself or heard any stories about issues on the A350 (or any aircraft) on departing - and as noted if you wanted to ensure it doesn't tip you certainly wouldn't load the back first if you really did have an issue all that needs to happen is the cargo handlers just ensure they load the front cargo hold first, and the rear one last.

I realise that, but it doesn�t mean they�re in the back rows? Group 3 is also likely to be economy as well (that�s basically bronze isn�t it?)

Except they were using door 1 to board. There's 0% chance you can board and clean at the same time on the A350... there's barely enough room to do either on their own, let alone together

My thought is maybe they were still boarding catering at the front of the plane, but then you said they were using door 1L to board so....

Is group 3 is bronze plus premium economy?