Repatriation flight CPT/LHR
Jun 7, 2020, 3:16 pm
#1
Ambassador, Emirates
Original Poster
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: LGW / AMS / CPT
Programs: SA KL BA EK
Posts: 4,273
Repatriation flight CPT/LHR
I usually read trip reports and think my own trips are not interesting enough to talk about. But I thought I should share the experience Mrs t and I had, being 'repatriated'. No pictures, sorry, just words.
We are based both in South Africa and the UK. Originally 100% SA, but we started some sort of transition in 2011 and now we are probably about 70% UK (including time spent on the European continent travelling from / to the UK).
In February we travelled to CPT from LGW 'the usual way', EK J (with a nice op-up to F from DXB to CPT). This is a regular route / trip, with Emirates Chauffeur drive on either side and a mandatory ice cream plus glass of Moët in the J lounge at DXB). The only unusual thing was that before entering the immigration hall in CPT we were met by military looking people asking us if we had been to "Asia or Italy" in the last 14 days and who also took our temperature. This was on 26 February, we of course knew about Covid 19 but that was our first 'hands on' experience with the phenomenon.
Our return was booked for 29 March, mrs t had some work to do on a few projects she is running in SA and my mother turned 95 on 26 March. On 24 March, it was announced that the country would go into lockdown from the 27th and airports would be closed. "B*&^er", we thought, what now. The EK flight was of course cancelled and those tickets are now 'open' for the next 720 days (we'll see what comes of that, it's not my intention to comment on EK's ways of handling the flight cancellations here.
So we were well and truly stuck. We have an apartment on the beach just north of Cape Town, so there are worse places to be locked down but it had not really sunk in how long this could take and how little we actually had left to do there. No visiting of family (I have my mother and sister there and our eldest son has his own business in Cape Town), just by 'phone and that we do from anywhere in the world anyway.
Around mid May, we found out that the British High Commission was planning a second set of repatriation flights for their citizens and they were asking interested people to register. Not long afterwards, we got an email stating that the British Government would be laying on 7 flights ex CPT (and 3 ex JNB) for British Citizens who were 'stuck' in South Africa and wanted to go home. Now we are not British Citizens, but we are EU citizens with settled status in the UK and we have a fixed address to return to. That was a category which would be accommodated on a 'space available' basis.
The set up was that one 'registered' and paid for a flight. One could not choose which flight, it would be between 24 May and 4 June, one would get at least 48 hours notice. They would check your eligibility and allocate a flight and seat if you passed the criteria and there was space. All seats would be allocated, taking vulnerability into account, the 'fare' was the same for all seats, one had no way to choose this. The flights were on BA metal. So we used the 'portal' to register and paid for 2 seats.....
.....And waited to see what would happen, knowing that if this did not work we might well be 'stuck' until September or later (and miss the arrival of our first grandson in London in August). We were aware of flights departing without us, the UK High Commission used both Twitter and Instagram to show this.
On 1 June we got THE email. We were allocated seats on the final flight on 4 June. BA 9114, leaving CPT 11:05 arriving LHR 22:15.
Now this was not a matter of just going to the airport 2 or 3 hours before the flight. One had to report to Green Point stadium by 6am (wearing face masks). There we were welcomed by British High Commission staff who checked our passports to see that we were 'on the list' and gave us a welcome bag with a few wraps, chocolates and water as there would be no food available until after the flight had taken off.
The South African Port Health Authority needed screening forms from us (which had been emailed beforehand) and measured our temperature after which were lagged with an armband as 'passed out'. A number of the bus which would take us to the airport was also given so that there would be no rush for the buses. Waiting for the buses in a hall with appropriate social distancing, same on the bus (everyone had an empty seat next to him / her).
Arrival at CPT airport was just before 8am and the place was completely deserted. The lights in the check-in hall were still off and the doors locked. At 8 someone arrived and the buses were unloaded one by one. First the luggage was taken off and placed next to the bus (the doors of the bus still closed) and a sniffer dog did his 'inspection'. We were then told to take our luggage and go to the check in desks.
This part was now relatively normal (good social distancing in the check in queue of course) but we still did not know what our seat would be. It turned out to be 13A/B, which are Premium Economy seats on a 747. I was quite happy with that, bearing in mind that it could have been 11 hours in pure Y (WT in BA speak) which would have been a struggle (seeing that we are used to J on EK). I guess they gave J seats to people with poor mobility which is fair enough. F was not used, except for / by the crew.
Security check and immigration was as standard at CPT.
By this time, the incoming flight had not arrived yet, it landed at about 9:20. No incoming passengers came off, so boarding started quite soon, just a few rows at a time. Temperatures were taken for the third time here. Again, on board one had to wear face masks all the time (except from when eating or drinking, obviously). This was quite strictly enforced by the crew. As far as I could see, all seats were taken (certainly in the WTP cabin).
Of course the service was the same for everyone too (no special meals, we had already told when booking). Shortly after takeoff a cheese sandwich and 2 packets of biscuits / chocolates. Water or juice or coffee or tea. These non alcoholic drinks could actually be ordered at any time, the response to the call button was impressive! Just when we thought almost 11 hours later that we were going to land without any further food, we were given a warm wrap and 2 more snack packets.
I found the WTP seat relatively comfortable for a day flight where one does not need to sleep. I can't sleep sitting up, so for an overnight it would not work for me. Only when you get presented with an IFE choice of another airline do you realise how fantastic ICE on Emirates is. I found the quality of the screen on this BA flight very good, but the offering.... Good thing I had a book on my Kindle to read.
We landed at LHR just as the sun set. When you land there, you get a good idea how devastating this crisis is to the airline industry (and in this case to BA in particular). Rows and rows of clearly unused 'planes everywhere. Very sad to see.
We parked at an airbridge very close to the arrivals hall at T5 (I don't think they normally park 747's at the 'main' terminal but I can well be mistaken in that), the e-gates were working so we were waiting for the luggage very soon after getting off the flight (we were basically first off as they used door 1L and 13A/B are the second row behind the F cabin and that particular door). Our expectation was that - with this being the only flight in the terminal - the luggage would come soon, but they clearly used a skeleton crew to offload and it took at least 40 minutes until we had our bags.
By that time there is no public transport anymore and you can only be collected by someone from your own household (and our entire household of 2 was on the flight), so I had already arranged a taxi home to Canterbury.
Strangely (to us), no-one at LHR was wearing face masks or was interested what our temperature was or any other health related screening. From 8 June (that's 4 days after we landed), all arrivals need to go into quarantaine for 14 days (either your own or organised by but not paid for by the UK government). That seems an enormous jump from totally nothing to rather restrictive!
I must say that this repatriation was planned and executed to perfection by the British High Commission in South Africa.
And we are happy to be back home (although we seem to have missed 'summer')
We are based both in South Africa and the UK. Originally 100% SA, but we started some sort of transition in 2011 and now we are probably about 70% UK (including time spent on the European continent travelling from / to the UK).
In February we travelled to CPT from LGW 'the usual way', EK J (with a nice op-up to F from DXB to CPT). This is a regular route / trip, with Emirates Chauffeur drive on either side and a mandatory ice cream plus glass of Moët in the J lounge at DXB). The only unusual thing was that before entering the immigration hall in CPT we were met by military looking people asking us if we had been to "Asia or Italy" in the last 14 days and who also took our temperature. This was on 26 February, we of course knew about Covid 19 but that was our first 'hands on' experience with the phenomenon.
Our return was booked for 29 March, mrs t had some work to do on a few projects she is running in SA and my mother turned 95 on 26 March. On 24 March, it was announced that the country would go into lockdown from the 27th and airports would be closed. "B*&^er", we thought, what now. The EK flight was of course cancelled and those tickets are now 'open' for the next 720 days (we'll see what comes of that, it's not my intention to comment on EK's ways of handling the flight cancellations here.
So we were well and truly stuck. We have an apartment on the beach just north of Cape Town, so there are worse places to be locked down but it had not really sunk in how long this could take and how little we actually had left to do there. No visiting of family (I have my mother and sister there and our eldest son has his own business in Cape Town), just by 'phone and that we do from anywhere in the world anyway.
Around mid May, we found out that the British High Commission was planning a second set of repatriation flights for their citizens and they were asking interested people to register. Not long afterwards, we got an email stating that the British Government would be laying on 7 flights ex CPT (and 3 ex JNB) for British Citizens who were 'stuck' in South Africa and wanted to go home. Now we are not British Citizens, but we are EU citizens with settled status in the UK and we have a fixed address to return to. That was a category which would be accommodated on a 'space available' basis.
The set up was that one 'registered' and paid for a flight. One could not choose which flight, it would be between 24 May and 4 June, one would get at least 48 hours notice. They would check your eligibility and allocate a flight and seat if you passed the criteria and there was space. All seats would be allocated, taking vulnerability into account, the 'fare' was the same for all seats, one had no way to choose this. The flights were on BA metal. So we used the 'portal' to register and paid for 2 seats.....
.....And waited to see what would happen, knowing that if this did not work we might well be 'stuck' until September or later (and miss the arrival of our first grandson in London in August). We were aware of flights departing without us, the UK High Commission used both Twitter and Instagram to show this.
On 1 June we got THE email. We were allocated seats on the final flight on 4 June. BA 9114, leaving CPT 11:05 arriving LHR 22:15.
Now this was not a matter of just going to the airport 2 or 3 hours before the flight. One had to report to Green Point stadium by 6am (wearing face masks). There we were welcomed by British High Commission staff who checked our passports to see that we were 'on the list' and gave us a welcome bag with a few wraps, chocolates and water as there would be no food available until after the flight had taken off.
The South African Port Health Authority needed screening forms from us (which had been emailed beforehand) and measured our temperature after which were lagged with an armband as 'passed out'. A number of the bus which would take us to the airport was also given so that there would be no rush for the buses. Waiting for the buses in a hall with appropriate social distancing, same on the bus (everyone had an empty seat next to him / her).
Arrival at CPT airport was just before 8am and the place was completely deserted. The lights in the check-in hall were still off and the doors locked. At 8 someone arrived and the buses were unloaded one by one. First the luggage was taken off and placed next to the bus (the doors of the bus still closed) and a sniffer dog did his 'inspection'. We were then told to take our luggage and go to the check in desks.
This part was now relatively normal (good social distancing in the check in queue of course) but we still did not know what our seat would be. It turned out to be 13A/B, which are Premium Economy seats on a 747. I was quite happy with that, bearing in mind that it could have been 11 hours in pure Y (WT in BA speak) which would have been a struggle (seeing that we are used to J on EK). I guess they gave J seats to people with poor mobility which is fair enough. F was not used, except for / by the crew.
Security check and immigration was as standard at CPT.
By this time, the incoming flight had not arrived yet, it landed at about 9:20. No incoming passengers came off, so boarding started quite soon, just a few rows at a time. Temperatures were taken for the third time here. Again, on board one had to wear face masks all the time (except from when eating or drinking, obviously). This was quite strictly enforced by the crew. As far as I could see, all seats were taken (certainly in the WTP cabin).
Of course the service was the same for everyone too (no special meals, we had already told when booking). Shortly after takeoff a cheese sandwich and 2 packets of biscuits / chocolates. Water or juice or coffee or tea. These non alcoholic drinks could actually be ordered at any time, the response to the call button was impressive! Just when we thought almost 11 hours later that we were going to land without any further food, we were given a warm wrap and 2 more snack packets.
I found the WTP seat relatively comfortable for a day flight where one does not need to sleep. I can't sleep sitting up, so for an overnight it would not work for me. Only when you get presented with an IFE choice of another airline do you realise how fantastic ICE on Emirates is. I found the quality of the screen on this BA flight very good, but the offering.... Good thing I had a book on my Kindle to read.
We landed at LHR just as the sun set. When you land there, you get a good idea how devastating this crisis is to the airline industry (and in this case to BA in particular). Rows and rows of clearly unused 'planes everywhere. Very sad to see.
We parked at an airbridge very close to the arrivals hall at T5 (I don't think they normally park 747's at the 'main' terminal but I can well be mistaken in that), the e-gates were working so we were waiting for the luggage very soon after getting off the flight (we were basically first off as they used door 1L and 13A/B are the second row behind the F cabin and that particular door). Our expectation was that - with this being the only flight in the terminal - the luggage would come soon, but they clearly used a skeleton crew to offload and it took at least 40 minutes until we had our bags.
By that time there is no public transport anymore and you can only be collected by someone from your own household (and our entire household of 2 was on the flight), so I had already arranged a taxi home to Canterbury.
Strangely (to us), no-one at LHR was wearing face masks or was interested what our temperature was or any other health related screening. From 8 June (that's 4 days after we landed), all arrivals need to go into quarantaine for 14 days (either your own or organised by but not paid for by the UK government). That seems an enormous jump from totally nothing to rather restrictive!
I must say that this repatriation was planned and executed to perfection by the British High Commission in South Africa.
And we are happy to be back home (although we seem to have missed 'summer')
Jun 8, 2020, 1:19 pm
#7
Join Date: Jul 2006
Posts: 1,345
Nice report!
It's interesting that you mentioned that all seats were taken on the flight. What's the point of social distancing at the stadium, on the bus, check-in queue if you're not going to social distance on presumably the longest leg of the journey.
It's interesting that you mentioned that all seats were taken on the flight. What's the point of social distancing at the stadium, on the bus, check-in queue if you're not going to social distance on presumably the longest leg of the journey.
Jun 9, 2020, 3:59 am
#10
Ambassador, Emirates
Original Poster
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: LGW / AMS / CPT
Programs: SA KL BA EK
Posts: 4,273
In the end we were quite happy to pay the £700 for the 'seat lottery' and of course the fact that we got Premium Economy seats made it actually quite a good deal! Within reason, price did not form part of the equation, we just wanted to return home!
Jun 16, 2020, 8:50 am
#12
Ambassador, Emirates
Original Poster
Join Date: Mar 2006
Location: LGW / AMS / CPT
Programs: SA KL BA EK
Posts: 4,273
We were told right from the start that the HC would allocate seats based on ‘vulnerability’. I guess we got our WT+ seats based on age (I am almost but not quite 70). On this final repatriation flight, the majority were backpacker age’.
There were certainly also people who were less mobile than us and were sitting in J. I have no problem with that, it was not a ‘let’s see how I can game the system’ occasion, we were 300+ people who wanted to use the last opportunity to ‘escape’ possibly several more months of lockdown.