Introduction
As I learned that Jet Airways has launched Airbus 330-200 on a domestic route between Delhi and Kolkata, I couldn’t hold myself back. It is every Aviation Geek’s dream to try all different products coming up. So I decided to continue my New Year vacation to Kolkata and meet few friends there.
Details
Del CCU
Jet Airways 9w 907
DEP: 10:50 AM
Seat – 5K
Flight day –
In the morning I got update about the delay of my flight. I saddled up and took it as slow morning instead of trying to rush to the airport. Finally, around noon, I decide to check out of my hotel. As I reached the airport, I got another text saying that the flight has been delayed further. The good part is that as this is beyond flight time, I can confirm on the spot that I have been upgraded, or I need to get the upgrade done manually.
Well, the flight was overloaded with more bookings confirmed as compared to the number of seats available, and I get bumped up to the coaching. Who wants to fly a wide body aircraft in cattle class when you can have a flat-bed business class?
Finally, the boarding starts at 2:10 PM. Yikes! This flight is indeed late. I had nowhere to reach. The meeting with my friends didn’t start until 6 PM.
The flight had a separate boarding area for premier customers while the economy was on another line. I realized that I had an entirely different entrance to the flight. The pantry area was behind the cabin.
Seat type
The seat arrangement is 1- 2- 1 format. So every row has an aisle access. Wonderful! They have seven rows and 28 premier seats on this flight.
The seat was in an alternate arrangement, and I realized I had chosen the wrong seat. I should have taken 6k or 4k as those seats have better window access than my seat. Next time I would keep this in mind.
The seat had a TV screen even though Jet Airways doesn’t provide entertainment on any of the Airbus in the form of either IFE or JetScreen. This being a long flight requires you to bring your own entertainment.
Next to the screen was a magazine compartment that had newspapers and Jetwings magazine.
The entire seat control was on the right armrest. If you open the armrest flap, you have an entertainment controller.
On my right was the storage compartment. The storage compartment was placed alternately. On my seat, it was on my left. Having a storage compartment provides more privacy and at the same time, a better window access. There is a reading lights on compartment itself.
The tray table could also be extended from the center armrest and could be folded over so you could use the whole thing, or just half of it.
The ottoman space was quite large, and my legs could comfortably rest on it. Sometimes, flights have very awkward ottoman spacing so your leg movement gets constricted. However, I had no such issues on this flight.
This is the mobile storage and charging area. However, this space is so small that any mobile kept here springs out. Another sad part, the charging doesn’t actually work and the charger doesn’t support Indian adapters. I mean, this is an Indian carrier, and Indian pins don’t work. Ridiculous!
Then at around 2:25 PM, they offered everyone pre-departure beverages, with the choice between watermelon juice or coconut water. I chose the coconut water, which was refreshing.
The Air Hostess also brought cold towels. Not that it was warm outside in Delhi, but I took it.
At 2:35 PM, they shut the door and started to taxi the aircraft to the runway for a few minutes. We were airborne by 2:42 PM.
Food
We were provided with following menu card. I opted for the age old famous Bhindi, Gatta curry amchur, and Pulao. There was no other healthy option available.
I was served food with some salad and fruits on the side.
For dessert, I had the apple tart with vanilla sauce. I should have asked for Malai Sandwich so that I could have taken a picture of it. I did enjoy some garlic bread along with it.
The lavatory of the aircraft was on the back side of the cabin.
I got some work done in the air. You can see some cables are hanging from my seat.
At 4:05 PM, the seatbelts signs were turned on. The flight circled over Kolkata for a while before it was given the green light to land. We finally landed at 4:26 PM. The flight stood on the runway for a while.
We had to wait for a few minutes on the runway before it was decided that the plane would be parked on remotely instead of getting a sky bridge.
At 4:34 PM, we finally came to a standstill, and they opened doors for us to leave.
Customer Service
The service was on the slow side. I felt that the crew was bored and didn’t really want to be there. I guess they were disgruntled because of the flight delay. As it was a roundabout flight for them, they had to fly back to Delhi. So they might have planned an early workday and gotten too late because of this humdrum.
Entertainment
