flying_blue_white_red

Hi everyone,

To visit a friend based in Doha, I flew RwandAir between Kigali and Dubai via Mombasa – Kenya, in Business Class to top up my FF DreamMiles account mainly and also because I was not in a mood to fly QR narrow body services scheduled to East Africa .





Following a crazy day, i arrived at the airport at 5:00 pm, roughly 10 mins before the check in closed. In some airports in Africa, you must produce your itinerary print out - before being allowed to go to the first security scan – that obviously i did not have time to get.

Waiting landside, a police officer took my passport and went to verify at the WB desk that i was effectively flying and, after a few minutes, let me reach the J class CI counter to collect my BP.




Immigration took ages as it looked like many passengers turned up at the last minute to destinations like Dubai and Nairobi for instance according to the lenghty queues there.

Sadly, i could not pay a visit to the rather basic Pearl lounge, operated by National Aviation Services (NAS) a UAE based company, but more up to date infos can be found here.:

http://www.newtimes.co.rw/section/ar...-11-25/183406/

After a final x-ray point that really needs a fast track access for J passengers, we boarded the 9XR-WG rather late because of, i guess, the evening wave of departures that congested this growing hub.





RwandAir WB302
Kigali – Mombasa
Dep.: 6:40 pm
Arr.: 9:10 pm
Duration.: 1:30
Distance.: 668 miles


RwandAir was Africa's first airline to offer the comfort of a Boeing Sky Interior cabin. This one has 16 recliner seats (more on this later).

Two cabin crew members operated in J, one of them offered a hot towel and a welcome drink with orange or tropical juices, water and SA sparkling wine (JC Leroux).




After taking off, the crew handed over the beautiful but thin blanket to the fairly loaded cabin (9/16). Seeing we were not given any, I politely asked to get the, good but not noise cancelling, headphones since the IFE was already activated and worked perfectly. Although with a smile, the hostess turned down my request and said headphones are only distributed after leaving Mombasa. Fair enough. The following minute a WB staff off duty (pilot or dispatcher maybe) seated in J, stood up and went to pick up the headphones in the overhead compartments to give to a client in the seat next to him... I was totally confused by the hostess words , and this good man gave me a pair not very long afterwards.

Before reaching the cruising altitude, the crew came to take the order (the choice was "beef or chicken", yes announced like this ...).

I opted for the beef which tasted very good and slightly spicy moreover the bread roll was warm. Since end of August 2014, there is a new catering unit at this small airport. Airline Services & Logistics PLC, a Nigerian company, was granted a 15 year exclusive concession in Rwanda, which allows RwandAir to serve hot and decent meals on the medium-long haul routes (i.e.: ACC, LOS, ABJ, DXB and JNB).
The dessert did not look appetizing and as i don't have a sweet tooth i have not eaten it.
The drink cart had the mainline spirits and liquors and a very interesting organic wine (white and red) from South Africa "Org de Rac".




We landed in Mombasa 30 min behind schedule where 4 passengers in J disembarked and maybe 20 in Eco.


RwandAir WB302
Mombasa - Dubai
Dep.: 10:00 pm
Arr.: 4:30 am
Duration.: 5:30
Distance.: 2275 miles


The J cabin welcomed 8 new travelers (13/16) and we taxied to the active without being served a pre departure drink, i'm not sure if it's the lack of time or just the protocol but anyone knows that Mombasa is so hot that this mistake represented a huge let down as i was so thirsty .

At cruising altitude, a hot towel and a first round of drink were served before being asked if we wanted to eat "beef, chicken or fish". After enquiring, the F/A told me the beef meal was different than the one offered on the first sector. Anyway i chose the fish thing which was a tilapia fillet in a creamy sauce with some peppers and green beans. It was ok, the rice full of flavour and the fish not dry at all, the bread roll was hot too.

The starter (smoked salmon) could have been ok if it did not swim in the cucumber water and salad dressing...The dessert was very starchy .

As often when flying, i asked the crew to try a second meal, one of them said there were not any left which was really surprising since at least 3 passengers fell asleep as soon as we left the stand at Mombasa and did not eat at all. Clever, she added after that she kept the meals left for them...

So in mid-flight, seeing that none of them had woken up since then, i pushed the call button to get one of these alleged 3 meals, betting the passengers would never request it. I don't know what happened in the meantime, but long story short, i ended up eating an Y class meal (chicken) which somewhat tasted really good . According to them i ate a crew meal. Are WB not loading enough meals for all their passengers ???




Probably due to the lateness of the hour, no service of tea/coffee followed, despite half of the travelers reading or watching a movie.




The IFE with PTV kept me busy for the rest of the trip. The content is a crowd pleaser with Hollywood blockbusters, European movies and Nigerian comedy/series for a total of 35-40 movies in French and English only. The music channel turned out to be comprehensive too despite not having any East African artists, so I listened the nice album “Africa shrine” from Femi Kuti as it proved very difficult to sleep comfortably in this cradle style seat (140°) with a pitch of 51'' equipped with a USB port and power outlet. During a daytime flight this type of seat would be bearable though.




Half and hour before landing the crew switched on the aggressive full lights, and sadly not the soothing blue lights of the BSI, for maybe 15 minutes, during when, strictly nothing else happened before switching them off for landing .

We parked at DXB T1 between a Congolese B757 of ECair and a B767 Ethiopian, with a delay of 20 mins.


CONCLUSION

Overall the flight was average, the catering (A paper menu would be a nice touch) and the IFE are better than before, one of the crew was not at all customer oriented. The seat is comfortable for a short leg only. So you guys, what do you think?

Many thanks for reading, comments and corrections always valuable .

Fredrik74

Thanks for the report. I haven't read much about Rwandair's offerings before and this sounds average unfortunately.

TPJ

Thank you for sharing... Always good to read a TR about an airline rarely discussed on this forum...

Short hair Francis

I agree, didn't even know RwandAir existed til now.

The BSI 738s, seat wise looks really similar to the ones operated by Malaysia that I usually fly on.

Glaring full white lights for 15 min prior to landing, agreed hardly necessary on the BSI plane, that's what the blue, or even sunset mode is for

flying_blue_white_red

Thank y'all for commenting

@Fredrik74:
Yup agree, from experience i would rank the airlines like this 1st: QR, 2nd: KQ, 3rd: ET, 4th: WB and 5th: FZ ( never tried this one though)

@TPJ:
Indeed, a FTer who went to Congo, and flew this airline too, gave me the idea to publish this report...

@Short hair Francis:
WB operates since 2003 and yes, judging by the pictures, the cabins are identical with MH.
Hope the crew are now aware of (and use accordingly) these modes, at least for the comfort of the passengers.

DanielW

Great read. Flew them a few weeks ago in Y, $339 DXB-KGL return so can't complain.

injian

Wow never heard of Rwand'Air. Nice TR and Pics.

mad_atta

Interesting report on one of the most obscure international airlines out there. Seems like a fairly reasonable product compared to regional competitors.

Thanks for posting! ^

Madone59

Thanks for posting. What a cool TR ^

flying_blue_white_red

@ DanielW:
Yes fares are usually attractive, glad you got a bargain too!

@ injian:
You are welcome, all the pleasure is mine

@ mad_atta:
Many thanks for reading and commenting

@ Madone59:
Thank you very much for your kind words

sftrvlr

Great report. Thanks for sharing. Nice to see reports on little known carriers.

flying_blue_white_red

Thank you very much SFTRVLR for reading and commenting .

Very famous Flyer Talk trip reporters like DanielW, Ironmajt and Rivlinm to name but a few, have already trusted RwandAir for their African trips and looked enterely satisfied. So I truly do hope it remains as such ^ . When you have time (if not done yet), you are strongly advised to read reports (linked here) of the aforesaid contributors.

Madone59

RwandAir is definitely one we don't see often. Thank you for sharing ^^