Review of Amelia International flight Paris → Castres in Economy

Hello and welcome on board this report on a small regional french airline named Amelia International operating most of small french lines for Air France.

introduction

We are on the early days of spring 2021 when French authorities starts to release travels restrictions due to the combined effect of vaccine and lower contamination spreading in Europe. Leisure travel was now possible at least inside the french territory borders. At the same time my company start to re-introduce some shift during the week-end giving me the opportunity to have some rest day's during the week.

To be honest, covid has hurt the airlines very badly and many connections, airlines and exotic aircraft's are now part of the past. This fact have reinforced my idea that I should fly on any av-geek opportunity when I can . I already took the Erj 145 , it was 19 years earlier for my first flight! It was a Lyon-Milano with Alitalia Express, with a superb crossing of the Alps which, I'm sure, was the event that started my passion for aeronautics.

I know that some Air France flights between Paris Orly and small south west of France cities are operated by Amelia Intl Embraer Erj 145 like Tarbes, Brive or Castres. This last city closest to my home town combined with attractive ticket fare (130€) for the return trip. Usually the ticket price on this line is close to 250€.

A bit of story about this airlines and why this line is part of Air France network :
France is a really centralized country and most of economical and political power is located in the capital Paris, to open up regions and to get attractivity some subsidized lines were opened many year's ago. Most of them were allowed to Air France via it's regional subsidiary HOP! who us to fly these routes with ATR42/72 or small Crj100/700. Now all these models where withdraw from the regional fleet forcing AF to contract other airlines to operate these flights.

Amelia Intl is part of Regourd aviation group operating many small private jet subsidiaries mainly in Europe and Africa like Slovenian Aero4M. Since few years Aero4M has become an important actor on charter flights for sports team, and it becomes even bigger with the creation of Amelia Intl operating a fleet of 12 Erj135/145 and 2 ATR.

It's the first report on Amelia Intl and also the first travel to Castres related on the English part of the website

PAris on morning sun

Although the flight has a late morning schedule, I still have to get up early to reach Orly airport from my parents-in-law's apartment in northern Paris. On the program, a short tour of line 14 then RER C from the François Mitterrand library then stop at Pont d'Orly to take the "GoC Paris" bus.
Once again the journey was strewn with pitfalls, the schedules of the various means of transport being more indicative than actually respected. The last minute changes of platforms as well as the lack of information for the "GoC Paris" bus gave me some cold sweats and after a little over an hour and a half of travel I arrived in front of Orly 3.
The only advantage remains an access price of about 6€, or even a little less because the composting system of the "GoC Paris" bus being broken down I would save the price of a ticket the driver will also be very nice .

I'm in a hurry to go to the security checkpoint where I know that the wait can sometimes be crazy, in the end I won't queue for a single second and the agents will also be very nice! Does Paris finally love me? So we meet at the duty free gates C.

For our flight of the day, boarding will be at gates C, for me one of the most "comfortable" wings of Orly, at this time the departure board smells of rural France, Castres appears alongside Tarbes, Brive or Aurillac.

Passage in this rather dark and cold hall.

Before leading to the gates area which is much more pleasant with shops and above all a beautiful view of the tarmac.

This Air France A319 is being pushed back for a shuttle flight to Nice.

We can also see the aircraft arriving from runway 25 in service for landing this morning, here an Amelia Erj 145 arrives from Rodez, a 100% Amelia flight without Air France code share agreement.

Alpha Victor was shedule on a rotation towards Brive on behalf of AF.

We continue in the series of Embraers from Amelia with this other Erj 145 which arriving from Tarbes.

There are also much larger aircraft in motion on the platform such as this AF Boeing 777-300ER which arrives from Fort-de France in French west indies.

For this A320 it is a departure for a shuttle flight to Toulouse.

The O not just AF or Amelia, we can also see Vueling with this A320neo which will leave mid-morning for Barcelona.

You can see a few turboprop there, Amelia's ATR 42-500 arrives from Aurillac while Twinjet's Beechcraft 1900D ensures another small conection to Le Puy-en-Velay.

Image which was rather rare before the covid crisis, the presence of Airbus A318 at Orly, this one provides a connection from Montpellier

And this one will soon go to Pau

Small variation in the colors with these 2 Air Corsica Airbus A320, the first arrives from the north of Corsica island (Bastia), its sistership from the south (Figari)

 Then it is the turn of our aircraft to arrive from its morning flight from Castres, it arrives a little late due to a rather long approach by the east of Paris.

A last set of A318s before our flight was called for boarding Papa Golf arrives from Perpignan while his colleague Golf Echo finished her flight from Montpellier.

Our flight is finally called for boarding at gate C20 at the time when it was supposed to be closed, a ten minutes delay is announced because of the late arrival of the aircraft.

E-boarding pass via AF app

But before boarding the plane, you'll have to do a small Paxbus tour!

The boarding operations not having been anticipated too much, it takes a little time, where we wait on board the bus. Along the way we kindly give priority to this AF 777-300ER arriving from Pointe-à-Pitre (French West Indies).
What an impressive sight when you are low to the ground in the bus!

We head for the Mike and November parkings, remote positions dedicated to paxbus boarding. You can see many A320 series from Af and U2.

We will roam for a while our location indicated by the ground coordinator is being occupied by an AF A320 after a short search, 2 phone calls and a U turn of the bus here we are in front of our device!

on board Amelia Erj 145

Boarding through the front staircase door, business aviation atmosphere assured with this nose and this shape of the fuselage!
Regarding the aircraft status, it is the same that was used the day before, F-HOXY, an Embraer 145 a little over 13 years old with the particularity of being of Brazilian design but assembled in China.

Indeed Embraer had, twenty years ago, set up a joint venture with Harbin to produce the Erj135/145 and jet Legacy 650 for the Chinese market. The operation will not be a great success, barely forty planes will come out of the Chinese factory in 13 years of operation. Unsurprisingly, it is therefore in China that our aircraft of the day has spent a good part of its 13-year career, mainly at Tianjin Airlines, stored for a loan of 2 years, it will join the portfolio of the rental subsidiary of Embraer (ECC leasing company ) before starting a new life with Amelia. 

I climb aboard the aircraft in the last, I was welcomed by the same single cabin crew has yesterday she was really classy and polite. , I do not have a long journey to make before arriving in front of my seat who is occupied by another passenger, the row in front is free I don't want to create an incident and it would not have been very covid friendly to take my place again… So I take the seat 3F anyway the view is also very good there.

Bulkhead pitch is good.

PSU panel for the detail of the cabin

Not being particularly early, we didn't take long to push back, taxiing towards runway 24 would be quite short, we met a few AF aircraft on the way.

 But the terminal west is quite empty at this hour.

Let's get into the runway !

 The 2 Rolls Royce engines are pushed to take off power and we tear ourselves away from the Parisian tarmac without any difficulty.

 We can see the Eiffel Tower in the distance as well as the Montparnasse Tower

 We guess the line of and the high speed train station of Massy while we cut the axis of the A10 highway.

Paris Saclay university

We can see a part of Toussus le noble city with Saint Quentin en Yvelines in the distance.

Shortly after take off the "Ki-ose" disinfectant wipe is distributed to passengers

 We continue our climb above the cultivated plains between Essonne and Loiret districts

Etampes airfield

Then we arrive quickly to the north of Orleans with the Franch Air Force air base 123 of Orleans Bricy.

Followed shortly after by the Orleans metropolis confluence of the Loiret and the Loire rivers.

The trolley made its appearance, I would be offered a glass of water in addition to tomato juice. Appreciable attention. The sweet / salty wasn't back at this time.

The forests of Sologne now passing under our wings, I think the town in the photo is Romorantin.

Then it's the turn of Châteauroux, easily recognizable thanks to the airport which is located north of the city, we can also see the silhouettes of some large aircraft still stored on the taxiways.

The atmosphere in the cabin is very calm, the passengers read, work or rest.

Reading is available via the AF play app which is really very good for domestic flights, too bad it's not grouped on the AF app. The only reading available on board is the regulatory safety card

 We continue our flight towards the South, we guess in the distance Brive la Gaillarde.

Flight radar path

 Then we cross shortly after the meanders of the Dordogne river

 Another Garonne feeder with the Lot river still further south.

While our descent is already well underway we pass the vertical of Villefranche-de-Rouergue. Will you find the airfield grass runway?

 The last rivers we cross on our way is the Tarn, on the other side of the cabin there must have been a nice view of Albi city.

We are still descending, we can see Graulhet in the distance, we can also see the concrete runway of the aerodrome.

We are approaching Castres from the north which allows us to fly over the west of the city while we are on final for runway 14.

 The foothills of the Black Mountains are visible in the distance, we can also see the main hospital of the city.

Landing on Tarn's land

Landing and strong braking.

 General overview of the facilities.

Unsurprisingly, the taxiing to our parking point will be extremely short. Passengers will remain quietly seated while ground operations begin and hand luggage is all placed on the tarmac in front of the door of our Erj145.

Last view of the rather classy cabin of our Erj 145.

And I leave the last with the greetings of the crew. Outside the sun burns the tarmac. I get my luggage, taking care to take some shots of our bird of the day. Bye bye Xray Yankee.

No paxbus the fifty meters between the airplane and the terminal are made on foot

Despite the modest size of the building, there is a luggage conveyor where the few checked-in bags will quickly find their respective owners.

View of the main hall which host all the activities of the airport, this side is very quiet because we find the facilities linked to departures (check-in counters, checkpoint). On the back side, car rental companies welcome their customers and there is a little more atmosphere ^^.

Exterior view of the airport which is almost completely empty of its occupants, the next flight is scheduled at the end of the afternoon.

Like me, most go to the very practical free car park located in front of the airport.

On the way, I meet the bus that connects the airport to the city center. For my part, it will be back to Toulouse after this first av-geek travel, a first since lock-down in early days of 2020.

Hope you enjoy the report see you soon for more flight reviews!