Review of American Airlines flight Miami Buenos Aires in Economy

Airline American Airlines
Flight AA931
Class Economy
Seat 37J
Aircraft Boeing 777-200
Flight time 09:00
Take-off 28 Oct 14, 23:55
Arrival at 29 Oct 14, 09:55
AA   #69 out of 96 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings. 591 reviews
a1imbot
By 6655
Published on 1st February 2015
I'm a High School student here in Washington, DC. I was invited to attend a conference in Buenos Aires last october – the school decided to pay for my flights, hotel, and meals!
Noting that the school was paying for the flights - they picked AA. At first I was bummed that I wasn't going to fly Delta through ATL, this roundtrip would have gotten me Silver Status. Too bad. No big deal.

The routing was:

DCA-MIA AA2206 B737-800 8:05pm - 10:42pm
MIA-EZE AA931 B777-200 11:55pm - 9:53am

EZE-MIA AA900 B777-200
MIA-DCA AA2326 B737-800

I left my house for Reagan Airport via the metro. Its a 30 minute ride with 1 transfer.
It was a full train around 6:30pm
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.24.14 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.24.41 PM

The AA counters at DCA were pretty empty:
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.24.49 PM

I don't have any photo's of the DCA-MIA flight, but it was very good. Nice FAs, comfortable seats, overhead videos playing CBS sitcoms, and power outlets in-between seats.

Transferring in MIA was very simple and quick.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.26.36 PM
I've always liked the sea shells in the floor. Nice reminder were in Florida.

Look at those delays to Buenos Aires! Lucky we're on time.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.26.47 PM

Since it was around 11PM, duty free was in the process of closing:
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.26.12 PM


Heres our gate
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.26.28 PM

Boarding priorities were not very strict. Elites, First, Business, then all of Y at once. I was at the front of the line so it was very quick.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.27.04 PM

Ugly Jetway:
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.27.13 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.27.18 PM

It was my first time boarding an AA 777. I had the new livery, but same old cabin.

photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.27.35 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.27.28 PM

Warm welcome by Spanish speaking FAs
The business seats look sad–
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.27.50 PM

Y seating was 2-5-2! Last time i flew a configuration like this was on a United 777 from IAD to CDG years ago! This cabin would prove to be much more comfortable.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.27.56 PM

I arrived at row 37 to find this!
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.28.03 PM

Not what i was expecting. I took my seat at the window and pressed the FA button for some attention. Never got any.
Boarding took a long time - eventually a woman came looking for seat 37H. She was a little speechless. I was too. The plane was mostly boarded and very full, yet she was able to find a seat a few rows behind me on the aisle. All of this was without any help from the FAs. Eventually a man came in a yellow AA maintenance vest with a new seat cover. The old one, which was on the floor, was soaked in pee! Ew! I ended up with both the aisle and window seats all by myself - both with clean seat covers LOL.

A view from my window around midnight:
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.28.44 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.28.19 PM

The seats were wide, and pretty comfortable. The IFE was minuscule, but at least it had some movies, tv shows, and a moving map.

photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.28.58 PM

Take off was quick and powerful
here are two views of the Miami CBD at night-
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.29.35 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.29.26 PM

FAs began their service by handing out crappy earphones.
Classic merger mixups -
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.29.45 PM

It was late, but a full dinner was served. Choices were chicken or pasta. No printed menus.
I chose chicken
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.30.09 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.30.03 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.29.52 PM

I asked for some diet coke and got the whole can. I left it on the half folded tray of the aisle seat. I had tons of space! It was a blessing considering practically everyone else had a neighbor.

photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.30.16 PM

The chicken wasn't bad. I finished it. Salad was medicare. Packaged dessert was not bad, but disappointing compared to most global airlines.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.30.28 PM

The pasta was really good. I was very surprised!
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.30.40 PM

Tea after dinner - this time they got the logos right!
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.31.03 PM

After dinner, I reclined my seat and slept for more than 7 hours! I've never been so comfortable in a Y seat. The head rests were affective, the blankets were warm enough, and the recline was ample. Now multiply that by two with a free aisle seat!

I woke up to blue skies and argentine pastures 37,000 feet below
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.31.59 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.31.31 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.31.37 PM

Breakfast was served 1.5 hours before scheduled landing.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.31.24 PM

It was a pretty miserable breakfast, but it was better than AF or UA transatlantic.
The yogurt was – yogurt, and the croissant was hot.

Good pitch - i'm 6 feet
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.31.52 PM

Beginning our descent into Buenos Aires. Now I see why those other flights were delayed!
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.32.08 PM

Uh oh. We were circling in thunderstorms!
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.32.21 PM

The storms caused ATC to shut down all runways at EZE. Captain came on to give some news - our flight was diverted to Mendoza - an Argentine city on the other side of the country. Closer to Santiago de Chile than Buenos Aires.

20 minutes later, the captain came back and said they were going to open one runway for us to land in Buenos Aires!

It was and extremely turbulent re-descent. So bumpy that some people screamed a little.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.32.16 PM

We landed to find tons of parked planes on all of the taxiways.

photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.32.27 PM

A barely visible KLM 777, a Lan 767-300, and an Air Austral Embraer


Spotted a Turkish 777 in a line of parked planes
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.32.58 PM

Everyone was eager to get off the plane, so deplaning was fast.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.33.32 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.33.25 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.33.15 PM

Last shots of the cabin.
Business class seats had tiny IFEs too.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.33.38 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.33.44 PM

First looks dated, but still very comfy.
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.33.57 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.33.51 PM

Peace out AA
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.34.12 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.34.04 PM

It was raining so hard that a good amount made it into the jetway as well! Welcome to Argentina!
Customs was fast, but baggage delivery took forever!
photo Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.34.24 PMphoto Screen Shot 2015-01-31 at 7.34.18 PM

Tourist bonus of Buenos Aires-


See more

Verdict

American Airlines

7.5/10
Cabin10.0
Cabin crew8.0
Entertainment/wifi5.0
Meal/catering7.0

Miami - MIA

8.1/10
Efficiency9.5
Access7.5
Services7.5
Cleanliness8.0

Buenos Aires - EZE

4.5/10
Efficiency9.0
Access3.0
Services3.0
Cleanliness3.0

Conclusion

This was a great flight with AA.

Cabin comfort was superb 10/10
Crew gave a warm welcome, smiled through their service, and were attentive during the temporary diversion. -2 for the absence of crew assistance with the missing seat cover.
The main dishes were very good. Salad and dessert were disappointing. Breakfast better than expected noting it could have been what i received on AF over the summer. 7/10
IFE had a movie I wanted to watch. It also enabled me to track our location. Good enough for this night flight.
Only arrived 20 minutes late even with an extra hour of flight time! I guess we would have been super early without the storms!

MIA was nice, clean, and efficient for a connection.
AA uses the old terminal 1 at EZE, which was terrible. They had buckets everywhere collecting rain water! At least the customs officials were efficient. As a french citizen, there was no Visa fee. Americans must pay $160 online before departing for Argentina.

Thanks for reading!

Information on the route Miami (MIA) Buenos Aires (EZE)

Les contributeurs de Flight-Report ont posté 3 avis concernant 2 compagnies sur la ligne Miami (MIA) → Buenos Aires (EZE).


Useful

La compagnie qui obtient la meilleure moyenne est American Airlines avec 7.2/10.

La durée moyenne des vols est de 8 heures et 56 minutes.

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6 Comments

If you liked this review or if you have any questions, don’t hesitate to post a comment below !
  • Comment 128323 by
    KévinDC TEAM SILVER 6668 Comments
    Thanks for sharing this latest report. Delta would have probably been a slightly better experience in Y, and it would have been nice to get status, but Silver on DL doesn't really get you much so you're not really missing anything. The pee seat cushion story is crazy...welcome aboard...here's a cushion soaked in urine next to you, LOL! In the end, it turned out it was a blessing since you got an empty seat next to you. So you're a French citizen huh? We have that in common...French guys in DC. I totally forgot French citizens didn't need a visa for Argentina...looks like I'll have to make a trip to Argentina.
  • Comment 128329 by
    whitelight44 346 Comments
    Great FR with nice pictures. Thanks for sharing :)
  • Comment 128341 by
    Esteban GOLD 19853 Comments
    Thanks for sharing this great report. Some people in J should be ashamed to leave their seat as they left it. Looked like a zoo.

    The salad was medicare? Loved this spelling mistake ^^

    Beautiful bonus.
  • Comment 128344 by
    lagentsecret 12186 Comments
    Thanks for sharing this FR

    It would be better with bigger pictures (1024 x 768)

    Great comfort with this free seat : I'm not sure that DL would have been better

    You got two mains and the pasta looks way better than the chicken

    Usually salad is medicare so don't be surprised lol

    A good flight with AA especially with a smiling and attentive crew
  • Comment 128377 by
    eminere™ 271 Comments
    OMG a pee soaked seat cushion?!
  • Comment 128452 by
    02022001 GOLD 4375 Comments
    Thanks very much !

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