# USAir to Europe InFlight movies?  General comments on airline?



## hibbeln (Aug 14, 2010)

Has anyone flown USAir recently to Europe?  We're looking at a flight from Charlotte straight through to Rome for next April (connecting from Detroit).  It is listed now as a 767.  Looking at their website, it appears that ECONOMY (that's us, the cheap seats!) has overhead movies     and the ENVOY class (twice as expensive) has inseat entertainment (which my kids have been spoiled with back in the days of Northwest and AirFrance).

Anybody know if I'm reading that correctly?

Also, we've never flown USAir before......any comments?  Reliable?  Financially sound to buy tickets for next spring?

The other option (being from Detroit) is a Delta flight....also on a 767 so would the entertainment be exactly the same in the seats for all 767s?

Boy, I'm kind of hating Delta more and more (used to love Northwest, oddly enough) so I hate to give them my business, and their flight is more expensive by about $100.


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## hibbeln (Aug 14, 2010)

The Delta 767 would be about $40 more....but I'm assuming with the same lack (?) of inseat entertainment.

For $150 more per ticket (or watch to see if they go down) we could fly from DTW to Amsterdam or Frankfurt on the Airbus330 which I'm assuming would have the inseat entertainment lack the days of yore with Northwest?


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## Twinkstarr (Aug 14, 2010)

hibbeln said:


> The Delta 767 would be about $40 more....but I'm assuming with the same lack (?) of inseat entertainment.
> 
> For $150 more per ticket (or watch to see if they go down) we could fly from DTW to Amsterdam or Frankfurt on the Airbus330 which I'm assuming would have the inseat entertainment lack the days of yore with Northwest?



Just checked with DH, he flew  out of DTW and the A330 had inseat entertainment. It was a codeshare at the time NWA/KLM on a KLM plane, about a 1 yr ago. The Delta A330's I believe have inseat entertainment.

You could check seatguru or the Delta site(I think if you look hard enough they will give the entertaiment options on the different types of planes).


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## senorak (Aug 14, 2010)

Last time I flew transatlantic, (UsAir from Philly to Paris), the coach class had the in seat movies.  But again, that was 4 years ago. Transatlantic flights were aways a huge improvement over domestic....whether UsAir, Air France, British Air, Virgin.  Hate to think even those flights have now gone "no frills". 

Deb


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## Twinkstarr (Aug 14, 2010)

hibbeln said:


> Anybody know if I'm reading that correctly?
> 
> Also, we've never flown USAir before......any comments?  Reliable?  Financially sound to buy tickets for next spring?
> 
> ...



Hey don't be shy about loving NWA, I did too compared to Delta(wish you could book upgrades online ala NWA). I'm sucking it up with Delta because I prefer direct flights(less chance of travel aggrevation). 

Just did the Delta direct flight DTW-HNL, can't hate them that much when it only took 8hrs to get back to Detroit. I think it was about 9 hrs westbound. Was able to upgrade with miles to FC, so it worked out for me. 

In 20+yrs of business travel, my most  travel stories had to do with Useless Air.


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## x3 skier (Aug 14, 2010)

I don't call them Useless Air for nothing. Mostly because of their policies, not the actual flights. 

They are as financially sound as anybody in the business these days. 

Can't comment on Economy Class as I have been lucky enough to get Biz Class FF seats across the pond every year. As Twinkstarr notes, seat guru will give you all you need to know about the airplane seating www.seatguru.com. The trick is knowing exactly which configuration your flight will use. For example, Delta has five versions of the 767, four of which are the main transatlantic airplanes.

Cheers


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## Carolinian (Aug 14, 2010)

hibbeln said:


> The Delta 767 would be about $40 more....but I'm assuming with the same lack (?) of inseat entertainment.
> 
> For $150 more per ticket (or watch to see if they go down) we could fly from DTW to Amsterdam or Frankfurt on the Airbus330 which I'm assuming would have the inseat entertainment lack the days of yore with Northwest?



All DL Airbus equipment is former NWA birds, so they are equipped like they were when NWA had them.  DL had no Airbuses in its own fleet until the NWA takeover.

And I share your feeling about feeding the DL Borg!

I have flown US from Rome to Philly late last year, and it was okay, but nothing special.  I don't remember the aircraft type or entertainment setup.  

The other thing to consider is that it is probably better to connect in Europe than in the US, because if you fly TATL into or out of Rome from or to the US or Israel they now send you through a special new terminal that is a real pain in the rear end.  If you arrive and depart on flights to or from a European city, you use the regular terminal in Rome, which is much better.


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## pedro47 (Aug 14, 2010)

Celebrity Cruise Line booked us from Amsterdam to Philadelphia, PA on USAir and it was very nice.  We did a transatlantic cruise.


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## Twinkstarr (Aug 14, 2010)

pedro47 said:


> Celebrity Cruise Line booked us from Amsterdam to Philadelphia, PA on USAir and it was very nice.  We did a transatlantic cruise.



Do you remember if there was inseat entertainment? OP is concerned about that.


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## vettebuf (Aug 14, 2010)

We flew transatlantic last October (UsAir direct from Philly to Paris). Coach class had the in-seat movies.


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## hibbeln (Aug 14, 2010)

Thanks everyone!   I appreciate the personal experiences and will research on SeatGuru!


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## Ken555 (Aug 14, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> The other thing to consider is that it is probably better to connect in Europe than in the US, because if you fly TATL into or out of Rome from or to the US or Israel they now send you through a special new terminal that is a real pain in the rear end.  If you arrive and depart on flights to or from a European city, you use the regular terminal in Rome, which is much better.





I just booked a biz seat on Alitalia from LAX to Rome for next year. It only has a bit over an hour between arrival and connection to another Alitalia flight to Florence, so I assume they know what they're doing about timing...

On a positive note, I was finally able to use some of my Delta miles for this ticket.


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## Twinkstarr (Aug 15, 2010)

Ken555 said:


> On a positive note, I was finally able to use some of my Delta miles for this ticket.



 Someone finally redeemed some Delta Skymiles!


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## Carolinian (Aug 15, 2010)

Ken555 said:


> I just booked a biz seat on Alitalia from LAX to Rome for next year. It only has a bit over an hour between arrival and connection to another Alitalia flight to Florence, so I assume they know what they're doing about timing...
> 
> On a positive note, I was finally able to use some of my Delta miles for this ticket.



Congratulations on finding a use for your Delta SkyPesos (the name coined by the TalkBoard president at FlyerTalk)!  Was it high, shoulder, or low season?  If you managed to score high season at the low miles rate, you are to be envied in your good fortune!

As to your connection in Rome, if the Alitalia flight is coming in to the new terminal for flights to and from the US and Israel, I would be concerned about a one hour connection time.  Maybe Alitalia is exempt from having to use that terminal, or maybe there is some quicker arrangement for connecting flights, but otherwise, I would not want that little connecting time.  The new terminal has two seperate parts, mid-field and street side.  You have to take a bus between the two.  Then from the street side section, you have to take a second bus to the main terminal which has the intra-Europe flights and those to anywhere other than US or Israel.  That would also mean going through security again. The one time I have flown to the states from Rome since this new terminal has been operating, I spent some time in Rome on both ends between the TATL flights and my intra-Europe flights, so I did not look for any more direct route within the airport to connecting flights, but I do not recall seeing one.  One of the other drawbacks of the mid-field termninal, particularly outbound, was that it had no food service outlets or newstands.


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## MichaelColey (Aug 15, 2010)

We flew US Airways in Coach to Europe (without the kids) last year and in Envoy to Europe earlier this year (with the kids).  I think they only fly two types of planes to/from Europe - The Airbus A330s and the Boeing 767s.  I know on both of our trips, we had both types of planes.  They were both a little different, but both were fine.  We preferred the A330 slightly.  The differences weren't big enough to make an impression with us.

One thing to keep in mind is that US Airways has a reputation of being sub-par compared to other airlines.  It's nothing major to us, just a lot of little things.  For instance, in domestic First, you rarely get pre-departure beverages or hot towels.  They don't use placemats.  You get served drinks in a plastic cup.  Flights under 3.5 hours don't get meals.  None of that (except the meals) really matter to me.  If you're not a frequent flyer, I really doubt you would even notice.

The next thing to keep in mind is the difference between flying internationally and domestically.  Internationally, you'll get meals (even in coach) and you'll have movies to watch.  The A330 has personal IFE (even in coach), while the B767 has overhead.

Our coach flights were actually enjoyable.  The day before check-in, we saw that the flight was fairly empty, so we switched to an empty middle section (four seats on the A330).  One of us sat in the aisle seat and watched the IFE while the other laid down across the other three seats.  Almost as nice as flying up front!

The Envoy flights were a blast for the kids.  They're used to flying domestic First, but international was a whole new treat for them.  You actually order off of menus.  You get an amenity kit (and my 4 year old daughter LOVED the eye shades).  The seat (on the A330 anyway) has a ton of controls.  My son (6 years old at the time) absolutely enjoyed the personal IFE with tons of kid's movies, TV shows and games.  Once we got to Europe, he kept asking when we were going home.  We finally figured out that he just wanted to fly Envoy again!


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## beejaybeeohio (Aug 15, 2010)

MichaelColey said:


> We flew US Airways in Coach to Europe (without the kids) last year and in Envoy to Europe earlier this year (with the kids).
> The Envoy flights were a blast for the kids.  They're used to flying domestic First, but international was a whole new treat for them.  You actually order off of menus.  You get an amenity kit (and my 4 year old daughter LOVED the eye shades).  The seat (on the A330 anyway) has a ton of controls.  My son (6 years old at the time) absolutely enjoyed the personal IFE with tons of kid's movies, TV shows and games.  Once we got to Europe, he kept asking when we were going home.  We finally figured out that he just wanted to fly Envoy again!



There is a chance I could use Continental ff miles on a USAir itinerary at the lowest First Class mileage level on our next Europe trip.  It's good to hear your first-hand experience, thanks.


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## Ken555 (Aug 15, 2010)

Carolinian said:


> Congratulations on finding a use for your Delta SkyPesos (the name coined by the TalkBoard president at FlyerTalk)!  Was it high, shoulder, or low season?  If you managed to score high season at the low miles rate, you are to be envied in your good fortune!



June/July. Outbound on Alitalia, return on Air France in biz. 100k pesoes...



> As to your connection in Rome, if the Alitalia flight is coming in to the new terminal for flights to and from the US and Israel, I would be concerned about a one hour connection time.  Maybe Alitalia is exempt from having to use that terminal, or maybe there is some quicker arrangement for connecting flights, but otherwise, I would not want that little connecting time.


Thanks for the details. I'm on a non-stop from LAX-Rome, so there may be issues transferring to the domestic flight to Florence. I fully expect the flight times to change between now and next June, but if accurate the LA flight arrives at 12:15pm, and the Florence flight departs at 1:20pm. Without knowing more, I'd normally be worried about that tight a connection anywhere. They have another flight leaving four hours later, but I'm never excited about a five hour layover after an 11 hr flight. 

Hmm... I just checked Alitalia's site and it won't even quote the itinerary Delta gave me - the Alitalia site only shows the LA flight and then the connection five hours later. Sigh. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. 

Just checked Italia Rail and it seems the train only takes 1.75 hrs to get to Florence from the Rome airport. I suspect I'll just cancel the connecting flight and pay for the train myself. I prefer trains, anyway! 

Another update... Called Alitalia and they said the minimum connection time is 50 minutes and that I won't have any problems with the 1:05 between flights on the existing itinerary. I was told I don't need to go through customs in Rome, of course, since I won't be accepting my bags until Florence. FWIW, I specifically asked about the new terminal and was told it's not a problem. Perhaps Alitalia flights are exempt in some fashion, as you suggest. Even so, I'm still considering the train instead since it appears I can take it from the Rome airport to Florence, and my hotel (SPG, of course) is only a short walk. It might be easier all around to do that than travel from the Florence airport, though I'm not certain yet. Ah... so many details...

Err.. and sorry for changing the topic of the thread! I'm guilty, I know it. US Air in-flight movies... well, my only comment about that is to buy an iPad and then you won't care if they have them or not since you'll bring your own!


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## hibbeln (Aug 15, 2010)

Thank you, everyone!  We are going to book the USAir flight due to the low cost, even though is doesn't have the inseat entertainment systems since it is a 767 (sigh).  Now that our kids are older (teenagers) I don't worry so much on an international flight with keeping them busy with them.....they can entertain themselves!?   
I'm thinking it might even be good on the way over to only have overhead movies, as they tend to stay up all night at transatlantic flights and watch movies instead of SLEEPING like they SHOULD BE and then are grumpy the next day.  So I'm hoping for bad movies on the way there so they will sleep!


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