Review of United flight San Francisco → Houston in Economy

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With the anniversary FR posted, I will go out of order and post a more recent trip.

This series was a quick trip to Houston. The Bay Area (SFO/OAK/SJC) to Houston (IAH/HOU) has very limited options non-stop. There is a little bit of OAK/SJC-HOU traffic on WN, but the biggest market share is owned by UA operating 9x daily service on SFO-IAH between these 2 hubs. UA does also operate 1x daily service SJC-IAH, but the timing of this flight was not compatible with my schedule so was not considered. When booking my ticket, I needed to make sure I would earn at least 2,500 miles to retain my *G status. I booked the outbound flight on the "early" red-eye in order to get into Houston before the morning rush hour. The return was booked on the last flight of the day to avoid Houston rush hour on the way to the airport. This would also maximize my time in Houston and minimize my time away from home. The routing was booked in Y on the out-bound and F on the return. The Y/F fare difference for the return was only $199 at the time of purchase, so it was deemed acceptable for the longer west-bound flight that would be during a meal-time and would ensure the requisite mileage earning. The routing is thus:

This report will be the brutal 3-hour redeye from San Francisco to Houston.

booking

When I booked this ticket, the flight looked fairly empty, so I picked a seat in the back to try and get several seats to myself.

UA seeks to tempt you with all kinds of up sales, like $560 for the "premium" legacy UA J cabin in 2-4-2 configuration, $150 for the EconomyPlus seats that clearly no one wants to pay for (the forward Y cabin was ~15% load factor), or $60 for some "cozy furniture" in the United Club. I always find this comical on UA, but on this flight the upgrade list will be 59 people^^ Like your chances? No wonder UA tries to get some cash for these seats up until the last minute before giving out the complimentary upgrades.

At 72 hours to departure, the Basic Economy seats were auto-assigned and the cabin was suddenly 100% full, which was a big disappointment for my prospects of getting some extra space to sleep in a cramped 3-4-3 cabin. At 24 hours to departure during OLCI, some upgrades were processed and suddenly 2 seats opened up in Row 35 so I pounced. I quickly switched to 35D hoping the seat next to me would remain empty. What is very interesting, is that when I do seat selection (shown on the left), 35E is shown as free, but if I look at the generic airplane seat map (shown on the right) it showed 35E as occupied. Does UA block seats next to *G? I hold no status with UA so would be very skeptical of this…

Pre-flight

After getting dropped off at Terminal 3 at 22:00, I went inside. The Premier Access lines for UA, which I will bypass as I have my mobile boarding pass and no bags to check.

Down the hall is the entrance to security, which is empty. The estimated wait times were 1 minute for both TSA Pre-Check and regular lines at this time of the night.

Three minutes later, I am airside and will head the direction towards the F gates since my flight is departing from Gate F15.

I quickly swung by my gate to confirm my plane arrived from HNL. Our 20 year old B772 taking a breather from its heavy domestic duty having spent the day doing LAX-HNL-SFO.

I then back-track to the United Club by Gate F11 to grab a quick break since the seating area at my gate is already full. The entrance is non-descript with no signage, unlike its twin by Gate E4 that has the now ubiquitous blue glass doors.

Entering this opulent recluse from the crowds outside^^

I scan my boarding pass and head into this nautical themed museum/lounge.

FIDS. Mainly TPACs and Transcons left to depart.

I peruse the buffet. It is the expected cold items (salads, sandwiches, chips, cookies). For the dinner hour, they have one hot buffet item: sauce soaked meatballs. I do not wish to partake in heartburn later, so I will take some liquid replenishment and look for a semi-clean area to take a rest.

I find an unoccupied corner with minimal trash to enjoy my chamomile tea with my "taste for adventure."

At 10:50, I get up and swing by the equally opulent bathroom adorned with nautical quotes on the walls before heading towards my gate.

Off to my gate in the very tired looking F gates that are in need of a remodel with stained carpets and dim lighting.

Our twin next door bound for ORD. 

Our plane, N219UA, ready for boarding.

flight

United Airlines, UA 505
Equipment: Boeing 777-200ER [N219UA, delivered January 2001]
Departure: 23:50 (ATD: 00:25)
Arrival: 05:38 (ATA: 05:25)
Flight Time: 3:00

The masses are assembled at Gate F15 for what looks to be a very full flight with a long list of standbys.

Pre-boarding is done at 22:55, followed by Group 1 at 23:00 on the dot so I try to cut through the cluster of people standing around blocking the gate to join the back of the queue and head in. Left or right into this decrepit jetbridge. The signs on the doors are A-E seats for the right and F-J for the left.

Joystick and a blocked 2L door.

A very warm greeting from this Houston based crew. I head back to the 2nd to last row of the huge forward Y cabin.

My seat 35D. 

Seat pitch is acceptable for a 3h flight at 31". For a long-haul, not so much…

A look at the cabin from the rear. A little caustrophoic with all of the center bins down, but it is quite open and airy once the bins are closed. This cabin of course has the new standard, a 3-4-3 in Y. The seats are those that debuted back in the late-2010s with ironing boards masked by blue faux-leather.

All seats have IFE, USB power outlets, and WiFi access for BYOD streaming. The IFE is small, but still is responsive and has a vast selection. I only used the moving map on this flight.

Contrary to what UA advertises online, there are not 3 AC outlets in the center section. It is obvious that the seating supports are from the old 3-3-3 configuration and the middle section was just expanded to 4 seats, which completely messes up the under seat storage in the D/E/F/G seats since the supports are not aligned with the seats. Luckily, the seat next to me remained empty so I did not have to deal with this issue. I would definitely avoid the D/E/F/G seats on long-haul since it is not easy to find a place to put your feet with bags under seat.

The head cushion is adjustable.

There were some haphazardly placed blankets around the cabin likely the leftovers from the previous HNL-SFO flight, so I grabbed the one in my row expecting it to be a cold flight.

Seatback contents.

Boarding completed at 23:40, but the captain came on and made an announcement that they were still loading bags from late connections so we would be delayed leaving SFO. During the wait, the crew quickly distributed headsets and travel kits for kids, which is a nice touch.

We finally pushed back at 00:08. The safety video played during the taxi followed by United ads, now featuring their partnership with EK. As soon as the safety video was done, the crew turned off the cabin lights in Y, which would remain off until final descent. One advantage of sitting in Y, since the F cabin remained lit until the dinner service was complete about halfway through the flight.

We had a rumbling take-off down Runway 28L at 00:25 and banked hard to the left to make our u-turn south passing over Half Moon Bay before heading down the Valley.

I dozed off quickly and had a cat nap until the service occurred as we approached Los Angeles. The crew came down the aisle in darkness offering BOB and the choice of pretzels or Biscoff cookies. I took the pretzels.

The drink cart followed, I was handed an entire can of apple juice and asked if I wanted a cup and ice. The service was done quietly as not to disturb sleeping passengers, which is a stark contrast to how I've seen this done on other UA flights. The crew was quietly up and down the aisle the entire flight collecting trash.

I connected to the WiFi, and this time it did work for me. I was able to access the free services with no issues (streaming, free SMS messaging), but the moving map was glitchy and would not show the map. Minor issue since it was available on the IFE. WiFi is $10, or $8 if you are a MileagePlus member.

I went to use the lavatory behind my seat, which was extremely spacious being handicap accessible and was clean.

A view of the cabin post-service.

I went back to sleep and slept until the captain came on to announce the final descent into IAH and the cabin lights were turned on. We approached IAH from the south and made our u-turn to make a very squirmy landing on Runway 27 at 5:25. We had a very short taxi to take our place at Terminal E and 2L was open by 5:30.

Deplaning was very quick and we were deposited into the far end of Terminal E, which is by far the nicest terminal at IAH.

It was a long 20 minute walk across Terminal E and then over to Terminal C to reach the Baggage Claim. There is a lot of construction on-going at IAH so it is not very convenient currently so Terminal E is not accessible land side and all passengers have to exit through the connected Terminal C.

I went out to the designated Ride App exit and was on my way out of the airport at 5:52. so a very efficient arrival overall despite the long walk.

Morning rush hour was picking up as we reached the city center 30 minutes later on a cold, windy, overcast day.

Flight details.

I'll leave off this series here during my short stay in Houston. Thanks for stopping by!