DEN-ATL On FL/Y
Jun 18, 2009 | 3:04 am
#1
Original Poster
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: ATL
Programs: DL SkyMiles, FL A+ Rewards, F9 EarlyReturns, AA AAdvantage
Posts: 3
DEN-ATL On FL/Y
This is my first trip report, so some constructive criticism will help. 
(I'm sorry for the few amount of pictures, there is an explanation in the report!)
I had recently finished up a 2-week, 5500 mile road trip from Atlanta to Oregon, then back to Denver. This will cover the flight from DEN back home to ATL with my favorite Atlanta based airline, AirTran Airways.
----------------
Flight: FL308
From: DEN
To: ATL
Plane: B737-700
Registration: N291AT
Date: 2009/06/17
Time departure (scheduled): 05:57 pm (MDT)
Time departure (actual): 05:59 pm (MDT)
Time arrival (scheduled): 10:32 pm (EDT)
Time arrival (actual): 10:27 pm (EDT)
Departure gate: A48
Arrival gate: D1
Seat: 15F (Economy class)
Load: C - 75% ; Y - 90%
1) At the airport
After returning the rental car, I rode the 5-minute bus ride to the AirTran check-in counters. The counters had two groups of people talking to the agents, and it otherwise seemed bare at our end of the counters, surrounded by empty jetBlue, Midwest, and Great Lakes counters. I used the simple self check-in kiosks, and walked over to the counter to check one of my bags. The check-in agent was surprisingly bright and nice (I've faced some cold AirTran and Delta agents at ATL), and I was on my way to security within a minute.
The large area of roped lines and almost too many TSA agents, known as DEN security, had a short line (Out of the fifteen times I've flown in and out of DEN, I've only had a short line about three times).Unfortunately, I was picked for extra screening, and I had to go into a fancy machine (I honestly don't know what it does, but I assume it's some sort of X-ray?). This only took about 2 more minutes, as I descended the escalator to the train.
After the quick ride to Concourse A, I began walking over to gate A48, AirTran's only gate at KDEN. As I passed gate A41, I found a little treat being pulled into the gate.
That is D-AIHD "Stuttgart", an Airbus A346 operating Lufthansa's daily FRA-DEN flight.
I, of course, had to take a picture as LH operates the smaller A343 into ATL, and I've only seen the A346 once before in real life. As I pull out my large camera (No tripod, it just has a large lens), a rough-looking female TSA agent trots up and says in my face, "Sir, you are not allowed to take pictures here!" As I wiped her saliva off of my face in a mocking way, I asked calmly why I was not allowed to take a picture of a plane. Her response, "TSA regulations state that no pictures may be taken in the sterile zone!" I obviously knew that was a load of bull, but I wasn't in the mood to argue with a woman that had more testosterone than the average female.
So, I ended up taking the picture with my camera phone, acting like I was doing something on my phone as the TSA beast kept a watchful eye on me. I proceeded to walk down to my gate so I can get away from her and see if I can get some pictures of the Frontier Dash 8's, which I could get a great view from down the stairs next to my gate. For some reason, she wouldn't leave me alone, and stalked me from far away as I walked down the concourse. When I made it to my gate, I just gave up, sat down, and took advantage of DEN's free wifi.
At around 5 pm, my plane pulled in to the gate early from Atlanta. I noticed the woman was still watching me with one eye, so I walked to the window and got another camera phone picture.
My ride to ATL.
I wasted the rest of my time on the Internet, and at around 5:30 boarding began. AirTran follows the boarding procedure of many airlines with the "zone system". I was in Zone 5, so I was one of the last to board, and I said goodbye to one of my favorite airports in the world, knowing I would be in a much worse airport in 2 1/2 hours.
----------------
2) In-flight
My plane was one of the planes recently installed with the Gogo wifi system this summer, but I later decided that the price was too steep, and that I could live without Internet for 2 1/2 hours!
As I stepped into the 737-700, I could believe AirTran's "new plane smell" slogan, as the plane really did smell new! The cabin was well-kept, and the seats and the surrounding areas seemed to be pretty clean. I was greeted by "Mr. F", my flight attendant today. As I settled into 15F, there was somebody in 15D, but the middle seat was empty. Luckily, this remained for the rest of the flight. I couldn't catch the name of the captain or the first officer, but they were both Swedish. After the safety demonstration and pushback, we proceeded to quickly taxi to the active takeoff runway at DEN, which was 8/26 at the time. After a WN 738 w/ winglets took off, we entered the runway in front of a ZK B1900D. We proceeded to use most of the runway on our takeoff roll, and we steadily shot into the cloudy sky towards Atlanta. Here are a few pics shot before and during takeoff:
Closeup on the CFM56 engine
Wing view with winglet and N932FR pictured
In position for takeoff on runway 26, with ZK B1900D pictured
The middle of the looooong takeoff roll
Bye Colorado!
About 10 minutes into the flight, our "meals" were passed out, which consisted of a small bag of their "gourmet pretzels" and a plastic cup of soda. Of course it was enough to hold me, and it's all that I expect on an LCC. The IFE, which is built-in XM Satellite Radio in each armrest, was decent, but I ended up using my own IFE
My PTV and three-course dinner
About 15 minutes after the snack was passed out, a trash collection came and I cleared my tray. I ended up watching 28 Weeks Later on my laptop (It's a VERY gory movie, and it's scary to transition from quiet talking to loud zombie shrieks with headphones..), and after it ended, we were about 20 minutes out of ATL.
One last drink service was announced (Only plastic cups of Dasani water), and another trash collection came down the aisle. The landing was the usual from a eastbound flight, as we flew north of ATL and east, and we softly touched down on runway 26R at around 10:40 EDT. We taxied very quickly toward Concourse T, and we taxied past all of the concourses, filled with DL planes as usual. Our original gate was D5, but when we arrived, another FL 737 was there (Not a surprise at ATL, they are horrible at organizing gates). So we just taxied to FL's only available D gate, which was D1 (If you've ever flown into or out of D, you know it is the worst concourse because of the limited hallway width and it's the longest concourse, which is a long walk to the trains if you're say...at D1?). Anyway, the deboarding process was very fast as many people had to make late connections to CLT, and there was a mad rush to the underground train.
----------------
3) At the arrival airport
I decided to hold back and waited for the crowds to clear first, then proceeded to the train. At that hour, the train is empty to the terminal because the train is coming from E (There are barely any international flights in or out of ATL late at night), but it filled up at C, then A (AirTran and Delta's main concourses, respectively). Only two escalators were operating for the ride to the baggage claim, and where passengers normally meet with their escort at the top of the escalator. We were not told what our baggage claim was, but I found our flight on the screen at Claim 6.
Here is another thing that ATL is famous for. Claim switches. After waiting for about 30 minutes, and the only bags that came out were from a US Airways flight from Phoenix, an AirTran employee ran over and said that the Los Angeles AND Denver AirTran flights were both already on the belt at Claim 2. So I fast walked like everybody else over to Claim 2, and fortunately my bag was pretty much front and center. I then took the shuttle to the long-term parking lot, got in my car, and drove home.
My flight map.
----------------
4) Review
The flight overall was pleasant, and I am again satisfied with AirTran's product. I now know that their 737 is better than their 712, but I already thought that anyway.
Grading system: 1 = Worst ; 10 = Best
Departure airport: 8/10 (Would have been 10/10 if not for the TSA agent)
Check-in staff: 10/10
Security: 9/10
Plane condition: 8.5/10 (Carpet was a bit dirty)
Flight crew: 10/10 (Fantastic FA's, especially Fred)
IFE: 7/10 (I'm not a big fan of XM Radio, but it's better than nothing)
Food: 7.5/10 (Only a little bag of pretzels on a 2.5 hour flight, but that's expected)
Arrival airport: 7/10 (Baggage takes forever as usual, and I'm still not impressed that the gate organization is still bad)
OVERALL SCORE: 67/80
AVERAGE: 83% ; Grade: "Good"
-----------------------
Thanks for reading, and I hope I didn't bore you too much.
(I'm sorry for the few amount of pictures, there is an explanation in the report!)
I had recently finished up a 2-week, 5500 mile road trip from Atlanta to Oregon, then back to Denver. This will cover the flight from DEN back home to ATL with my favorite Atlanta based airline, AirTran Airways.
----------------
Flight: FL308
From: DEN
To: ATL
Plane: B737-700
Registration: N291AT
Date: 2009/06/17
Time departure (scheduled): 05:57 pm (MDT)
Time departure (actual): 05:59 pm (MDT)
Time arrival (scheduled): 10:32 pm (EDT)
Time arrival (actual): 10:27 pm (EDT)
Departure gate: A48
Arrival gate: D1
Seat: 15F (Economy class)
Load: C - 75% ; Y - 90%
1) At the airport
After returning the rental car, I rode the 5-minute bus ride to the AirTran check-in counters. The counters had two groups of people talking to the agents, and it otherwise seemed bare at our end of the counters, surrounded by empty jetBlue, Midwest, and Great Lakes counters. I used the simple self check-in kiosks, and walked over to the counter to check one of my bags. The check-in agent was surprisingly bright and nice (I've faced some cold AirTran and Delta agents at ATL), and I was on my way to security within a minute.
The large area of roped lines and almost too many TSA agents, known as DEN security, had a short line (Out of the fifteen times I've flown in and out of DEN, I've only had a short line about three times).Unfortunately, I was picked for extra screening, and I had to go into a fancy machine (I honestly don't know what it does, but I assume it's some sort of X-ray?). This only took about 2 more minutes, as I descended the escalator to the train.
After the quick ride to Concourse A, I began walking over to gate A48, AirTran's only gate at KDEN. As I passed gate A41, I found a little treat being pulled into the gate.
That is D-AIHD "Stuttgart", an Airbus A346 operating Lufthansa's daily FRA-DEN flight.
I, of course, had to take a picture as LH operates the smaller A343 into ATL, and I've only seen the A346 once before in real life. As I pull out my large camera (No tripod, it just has a large lens), a rough-looking female TSA agent trots up and says in my face, "Sir, you are not allowed to take pictures here!" As I wiped her saliva off of my face in a mocking way, I asked calmly why I was not allowed to take a picture of a plane. Her response, "TSA regulations state that no pictures may be taken in the sterile zone!" I obviously knew that was a load of bull, but I wasn't in the mood to argue with a woman that had more testosterone than the average female.
So, I ended up taking the picture with my camera phone, acting like I was doing something on my phone as the TSA beast kept a watchful eye on me. I proceeded to walk down to my gate so I can get away from her and see if I can get some pictures of the Frontier Dash 8's, which I could get a great view from down the stairs next to my gate. For some reason, she wouldn't leave me alone, and stalked me from far away as I walked down the concourse. When I made it to my gate, I just gave up, sat down, and took advantage of DEN's free wifi.
At around 5 pm, my plane pulled in to the gate early from Atlanta. I noticed the woman was still watching me with one eye, so I walked to the window and got another camera phone picture.
My ride to ATL.
I wasted the rest of my time on the Internet, and at around 5:30 boarding began. AirTran follows the boarding procedure of many airlines with the "zone system". I was in Zone 5, so I was one of the last to board, and I said goodbye to one of my favorite airports in the world, knowing I would be in a much worse airport in 2 1/2 hours.
----------------
2) In-flight
My plane was one of the planes recently installed with the Gogo wifi system this summer, but I later decided that the price was too steep, and that I could live without Internet for 2 1/2 hours!
As I stepped into the 737-700, I could believe AirTran's "new plane smell" slogan, as the plane really did smell new! The cabin was well-kept, and the seats and the surrounding areas seemed to be pretty clean. I was greeted by "Mr. F", my flight attendant today. As I settled into 15F, there was somebody in 15D, but the middle seat was empty. Luckily, this remained for the rest of the flight. I couldn't catch the name of the captain or the first officer, but they were both Swedish. After the safety demonstration and pushback, we proceeded to quickly taxi to the active takeoff runway at DEN, which was 8/26 at the time. After a WN 738 w/ winglets took off, we entered the runway in front of a ZK B1900D. We proceeded to use most of the runway on our takeoff roll, and we steadily shot into the cloudy sky towards Atlanta. Here are a few pics shot before and during takeoff:
Closeup on the CFM56 engine
Wing view with winglet and N932FR pictured
In position for takeoff on runway 26, with ZK B1900D pictured
The middle of the looooong takeoff roll
Bye Colorado!
About 10 minutes into the flight, our "meals" were passed out, which consisted of a small bag of their "gourmet pretzels" and a plastic cup of soda. Of course it was enough to hold me, and it's all that I expect on an LCC. The IFE, which is built-in XM Satellite Radio in each armrest, was decent, but I ended up using my own IFE
My PTV and three-course dinner
About 15 minutes after the snack was passed out, a trash collection came and I cleared my tray. I ended up watching 28 Weeks Later on my laptop (It's a VERY gory movie, and it's scary to transition from quiet talking to loud zombie shrieks with headphones..), and after it ended, we were about 20 minutes out of ATL.
One last drink service was announced (Only plastic cups of Dasani water), and another trash collection came down the aisle. The landing was the usual from a eastbound flight, as we flew north of ATL and east, and we softly touched down on runway 26R at around 10:40 EDT. We taxied very quickly toward Concourse T, and we taxied past all of the concourses, filled with DL planes as usual. Our original gate was D5, but when we arrived, another FL 737 was there (Not a surprise at ATL, they are horrible at organizing gates). So we just taxied to FL's only available D gate, which was D1 (If you've ever flown into or out of D, you know it is the worst concourse because of the limited hallway width and it's the longest concourse, which is a long walk to the trains if you're say...at D1?). Anyway, the deboarding process was very fast as many people had to make late connections to CLT, and there was a mad rush to the underground train.
----------------
3) At the arrival airport
I decided to hold back and waited for the crowds to clear first, then proceeded to the train. At that hour, the train is empty to the terminal because the train is coming from E (There are barely any international flights in or out of ATL late at night), but it filled up at C, then A (AirTran and Delta's main concourses, respectively). Only two escalators were operating for the ride to the baggage claim, and where passengers normally meet with their escort at the top of the escalator. We were not told what our baggage claim was, but I found our flight on the screen at Claim 6.
Here is another thing that ATL is famous for. Claim switches. After waiting for about 30 minutes, and the only bags that came out were from a US Airways flight from Phoenix, an AirTran employee ran over and said that the Los Angeles AND Denver AirTran flights were both already on the belt at Claim 2. So I fast walked like everybody else over to Claim 2, and fortunately my bag was pretty much front and center. I then took the shuttle to the long-term parking lot, got in my car, and drove home.
My flight map.
----------------
4) Review
The flight overall was pleasant, and I am again satisfied with AirTran's product. I now know that their 737 is better than their 712, but I already thought that anyway.
Grading system: 1 = Worst ; 10 = Best
Departure airport: 8/10 (Would have been 10/10 if not for the TSA agent)
Check-in staff: 10/10
Security: 9/10
Plane condition: 8.5/10 (Carpet was a bit dirty)
Flight crew: 10/10 (Fantastic FA's, especially Fred)
IFE: 7/10 (I'm not a big fan of XM Radio, but it's better than nothing)
Food: 7.5/10 (Only a little bag of pretzels on a 2.5 hour flight, but that's expected)
Arrival airport: 7/10 (Baggage takes forever as usual, and I'm still not impressed that the gate organization is still bad)
OVERALL SCORE: 67/80
AVERAGE: 83% ; Grade: "Good"
-----------------------
Thanks for reading, and I hope I didn't bore you too much.
Last edited by Hartsfield; Jun 19, 2009 at 2:53 am Reason: Reuploaded photo
Jun 18, 2009 | 4:39 pm
#2
Join Date: Feb 2006
Location: MSN/HOU
Programs: DL Silver (0.239 MM), DL SkyClub Life, IHG Plat, Hilton Gold
Posts: 1,107
Great trip report! As for the TSA hero, I'd have been a bit more confrontational in asserting my rights, but I can understand wanting to just get on with things.
Jun 18, 2009 | 4:53 pm
#3
Join Date: Feb 2008
Location: Mountain West USA
Posts: 436
Nice...just can't seem to get the picture of the LH A340 to come up.
As for the TSA, I can't wait for them to tell me to stop taking pictures while I'm in uniform. I'll just badge through a door, go outside, and continue what I was doing, just to piss them off.
As for the TSA, I can't wait for them to tell me to stop taking pictures while I'm in uniform. I'll just badge through a door, go outside, and continue what I was doing, just to piss them off.
Jun 19, 2009 | 12:27 am
#4
Original Poster
Join Date: Jun 2009
Location: ATL
Programs: DL SkyMiles, FL A+ Rewards, F9 EarlyReturns, AA AAdvantage
Posts: 3
Thanks!
I do normally create a fuss and scare off the TSA folks who badger me about pics at ATL, but after such a long trip I just wanted to go home
I will try to re-upload the pic, I discovered on my second computer that the picture was not loading, too.
Haha, that is a good idea. The only TSA folks I feel sympathy for are the ones that have to deal with the dumb travellers in the security lines (Like when they don't take off their shoes 
). I've always hated the trolls on airside that just love to stop people from doing harmless things, even if they don't make any sense. Hopefully things will change once the security levels start dropping, which may take a while.
Originally Posted by GreatChecko
Nice...just can't seem to get the picture of the LH A340 to come up.
Originally Posted by GreatChecko
As for the TSA, I can't wait for them to tell me to stop taking pictures while I'm in uniform. I'll just badge through a door, go outside, and continue what I was doing, just to piss them off.
). I've always hated the trolls on airside that just love to stop people from doing harmless things, even if they don't make any sense. Hopefully things will change once the security levels start dropping, which may take a while.
Jun 19, 2009 | 1:14 am
#5
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