zrs70

My third and last COncorde flight. As there have been many, many trip reports, I'll just list the particulars.

1) Great lounge service. Food to order, plenty of drinks. But most important, plenty of courteous service.

2) 6:30 pm departure. Not as great as the 10:30am.

3) Pretty full flight. Boarding was smooth. Take off was spectacular.

4) Great meal service. Delicious lamb.

5) No caviar.

6) No stationary kits at all.

7) No gift (but this is no surprise). Got a Wedgewood plate three years ago.

8) Cockpit visit offered after landing. Agent said, "This will be a once in a lifetime thing." (I wonder if he was briefed about the end of concorde service).

9) Through customs in no time. Bag received within minutes.

How sad that Concorde is going. I hope that in the last few months, BA piles on the amenities. It would be nice if BA offers memorablia to passengers.

pallensf

Thanks for the brief but well informed synopsis...

I always hoped that I would have had the pleasure of flying once on the Concorde...

When does it officially go out of service?

Blessings...

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Patrick A. Inouye, CMT
volunteer trip reports moderator

YoffieLA

I had the pleasure to join in the trip mentioned above with ZRS70.

This was my first Concorde flight, and I was pretty excited both months in advance and in building up to the final hours before departure.

ZRS70 filed a great trip report, and I will add a few additional thoughts of my own as well.

From the moment we approached the special Concorde Check-In desks, we were made to feel special. Baggage checked was placed in special clear plastic travel bags (perhaps so they would not get either dirty or wet upon loading or unloading). Also we were assured that the bags will be off the plane and in the US Customs hall within 8 minutes of pulling up to the gate. We were among the first off the plane, regretfully declining the flight crew's offer for the once in a lifetime visit to the cockpit (tight connection to fly home to LAX), and the bags met us there within moments.

Also, prior to flight, while waiting in the departure lounge, the pilot came on the intercom about an hour before flight. He kindly announced that he was available to meet all the passangers, and to answer any questions that we may have before the flight.

Several times during flight, the pilot came on the intercom again and carefully explained the process of the Concorde flight, the stages of acceleration and the push past MACH 1, the speed of sound. His reassuring voice helped us "newbie" Concorde passangers to understand the flight better and what to expect next.

At one point during the first 30 minutes out from London, the pilot made mention to the BA 747 flight down below the plane on the right side. It had left LHR bound for JFK as well, and having left somewhat before us, we were now passing it. He then mentioned that we were to arrive at JFK some 3 hours 15 minutes before our friends.

All flight attendants were very courteous and worked very hard throughout the flight serving meals, appetizers, drinks, dessert and finally coming by with the Duty Free cart containing many Concorde specialty items.

They offer to help take photos before take off, during flight and probably after we left as well. One even made mention the optimum time to take the photo and to pose in front of the "MACH 2 Display Board" showing speed and other settings at the time we reached maxumum velocity and altitude.

Considering ZRS70 and I flew this flight utilizing our Qantas miles via Starwood Points via various other sources, we were very lucky and felt very priviledged to have been able to enjoy this experience.

BA made me feel like flying was an all together new experience, and that each passanger was treated with the kind of attention and service that I have read and imagined what it must have been to be amongst the first jet-setters back in the 1950's/1960's era.

Thank you British Airways for a wonderful "lifetime-experience" flight.

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" ...overcoming my fears of turbulence one glass of chardonnay at a time. "

tfjim

So? You made your United connection?

zrs70

No, that's a different story...

We were originally on the 7:30 JFK-LAX UA flight. But UA discontinued this, and we had to settle for a connection through IAD, the JFK-IAD being on the J41, leaving at 7:10.

I had been checking the stats on that 710 departure, and over a two week period, it was either delayed or cancelled 70% of the time. A delay meant no way of making our 45 minute connection in IAD for the LAX flight.

So I had plan B in mind, that should our flight be delayed, UA would endorse us to the nonstop JFK-LAX flight on DL. I was hoping that this would be the case, as I really didn't want to take the J41.

Of course, the UA flight out of LAX was delayed. We got our DL flight, upped with miles to Biz Elite, had a great lounge and shower experience, and made it to LA in style.