Lufthansa has loaded into its reservation system specific flights where passengers flying on an A380 will find the new Business Class cabin. The update only goes through early April which is normal since LH does not assign specific aircraft to specific routes too far in advance.
Additionally, a new A380 is joining the fleet (D-AIMK) with the new Business Class cabin already installed so there will 2 A380s with the new Business Class cabins in service.
You’ll see below that they are really spreading around the 2 A380s so that a wide variety of cities will get a look at the new interior.
Here is the schedule (Frankfurt Departures so return flights on these days will have new cabin as well):
March 30: LH 400 (FRA-JFK), LH 720 (FRA-PEK)
March 31: LH 720 (FRA-PEK), LH 778 (FRA-SIN)
April 1: LH 778 (FRA-SIN)
April 2: LH 440 (FRA-IAH)
April 3: LH 440 (FRA-IAH), LH 728 (FRA-PVG)
April 4: LH 572 (FRA-JNB), LH 728 (FRA-PVG)
April 5: LH 572 (FRA-JNB)
April 6: LH 462 (FRA-MIA)
April 7: LH 400 (FRA-JFK), LH 462 (FRA-MIA)
April 8: LH 400 (FRA-JFK), LH 720 (FRA-PEK)
April 9: LH 720 (FRA-PEK), LH 778 (FRA-SIN).
Of course route rotation will continue beyond these dates and more A380s will see the new cabin over the coming months. I’ll provide updates as best that I can.
In late November I had the opportunity to visit AUSTRIAN Technik and take a behind-the-scenes look of their facility in Vienna. I was expecting a high level tour highlighting a few key pieces of the operation, but what took place was quite the opposite. The head of the facility was kind of enough to spend over 2 hours personally escorting me throughout the hangars showing me every aspect of their operation.
As part of the tour I had the ability to board an A320 during a comprehensive C-Check (Interior cabin and panels removed for thorough inspection), tour the various departments (Metal Fabricating, Upholstery, Paint, Tires/Brakes, Engine, Graphic Design and the main Engineering offices) and had free reign to poke, prod or handle anything that I came across. I’ll cover these parts of the tour in upcoming posts since there is simply too much to cover in a single writing. This was truly a fantastic experience for this recovering Avgeek!
As my luck would have it during my visit, one of OS’ Boeing 777s was being brought into the hangar to have its Air Conditioning System serviced before its flight later that day. So obviously we took time out of the tour to watch this take place. It’s not everyday that an airline arranges this kind of an event for a visitor 😉 !
The timing was perfect and I had the ability to climb up a 4 story A320 scaffolding to capture the 777 being towed into position:
As usual for these kind of posts, I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story:
Looking down from the A320 Scaffold
The A320 Scaffold is approximately 5 stories tall
Not a bad vantage point!
A quick look at AUSTRIAN’s new Business Class Cabin
Before you start packing, please note that this contest is NOT open to residents of the USA, Canada and mega-power Italy…..BUT is still a fantastic opportunity if you have the proper citizenship.
To celebrate their 20th Anniversary Miles & More has launched a fantastic contest that runs through the end of September which will award a very LUCKY WINNER (and an even luckier guest) a trip around the world consisting of 20 BUSINESS CLASS segments on any combination of Miles & More member airlines including Lufthansa, Austrian, Swiss, germanwings, LOT Polish, Croatia Airlines, Adria, Luxair and Air Dolomiti. Additionally, United Airlines is part of the group as well for the purposes of this contest (or did United join Miles & More when no one was looking??).
Anywho, the contest is actually entertaining and requires a little bit of effort to be eligible for the fantastic prize. To become eligible for the drawing, you must answer 20 questions based on 20 different destinations. You have to use the contest’s “Departure Board” to gain access to the questions and you can only answer a question on a destination if a flight to/from that destination is currently taking place. In other words, it will take you a bit of time to get through all 20 questions and you’ll need to check the contest entry page often to see which flights are active. This is what the departure board looks like:
You use this board to gain access to the 20 questions that you need to answer. You can only answer questions if a flight is active.
For each of the 20 destination related questions, you’ll have 4 answer options to choose from. Once you correctly answer each question you will gain a boarding pass. Once you have collected all 20 boarding passes you will entered into the Grand Prize Drawing.
The contest runs from 2 September to 30 September. The winner must begin their trip by 31 December 2014 but the trip can be completed in stages so long as the first stage takes place by 31 December 2014.
The winner will also receive 2 nights accomodation at 4-star Marriott or equivalent hotel in each city along their journey. Should the winner wish to spend extra time in a given destination, the additional night’s lodging will be at the winner’s expense.
