Hello everyone and welcome to another flight report. This time i will be flying from Karachi to Istanbul on board a Turkish Airlines Airbus A330-200 . Please note that this flight is from back in August 2018 and at that time the old Istanbul Ataturk Airport was still in operation. Also for those interested a video version of this flight is available on my YouTube channel , link is attached above.
My journey starts from the check in desks for my flight. As it was an off-peak travel time of the year the load of my flight was 50% full.
Alright I'm done with check in , immigration and security. Time to head to my gate.
While walking to my gate got a picture of two of the three big middle eastern airlines side by side.An Etihad A320 and a Qatar Airways Airbus A350-900 heading to Abu Dhabi and Doha respectively. If given the choice who would you travel with ? Etihad or Qatar Airways ?
The seating area at the international satellite terminal was surprisingly empty . I have travelled out of Karachi many times and early morning is usually one of the busy travel times of the day especially for international flights. I guess like my flight the other flights also had a very low load.
Anyways made it to the gate for my flight.Got pretty blurry view of the aircraft flying me out to Istanbul. A 2008 built Airbus A330-200 with the registration of TC-JIR.
After sometime it was time to board the a330. Made my way to Seat 27K, had a nice view from my seat for the 6 hour flight to Istanbul.
The seat consisted of a IFE screen and some really good legroom. This seat also had a footrest which on long haul flights is always appreciated.
Also present on the seat were a comfortable pillow and blanket and some earphones.
The seat pocket contents consisted of the " Skylife" inflight magazine , the a330-200 safety card and a disposable bag.
Shortly an inflight safety video inspired by the "Lego Movie" was shown on the IFE screens , and its was quiet interesting. . Do you like these interesting safety videos or would you want to stick with the basic simple safety video?
We pushed back from our gate on time and made our way to Runway 25L take off.
A quick taxi to Runway 25L we take off in the darkness on our scheduled departure time bound for Istanbul.
For those interested the take off from Karachi is linked above.
A right turn after take off and we are on route to Istanbul. Meanwhile some signs of light which is always good as no more blurry pics.
Looks like we toke off just in time for the sunrise.Sunrises from high up in the sky our always a treat for the eyes, i mean besides being remarkable i can't really find any other words to describe it .
Shortly after we reached cruising altitude the cabin crew distributed these small amenity kits. Now getting an amenity kit in economy class these days is close to nearly never especially on medium long haul flights like these . The contents of its included a pair of socks, eye mask and ear plugs. Nothing to fancy but its a thought that a always counts so good job Turkish Airlines.
Around 1 hour and 30 minutes into the flight the breakfast service commenced. There was one option only for the main course . Now i want to know how many of you who have travelled on a Turkish Airlines flight departing early morning and got served this exact same meal? It really looks like TK serve these meal on numerous of there flights. Anyways the main meal consisted of a turkey sandwich, cheese pastry and sauteed spinach. It was accompanied by cheese and olives starter , a delicious cherry cake , a cup of water and a fresh bread roll. The meal overall was tasty , however this was the only meal served on this flight that was close to 6 hours long.
A quick look outside the window and we are cruising at 38000 feet somewhere over Iran.
The IFE system that Turkish Airlines have installed on there Airbus A330s is really good and loads with tons of movies , tv shows with whole seasons, games etc . You can easily pass your time on a long haul flight. The touchscreen was also super responsive and i had no issues at all.
Some more stunning views along the way. After taking a few pictures i completely dozed off and woke up just in time before we commenced our descent into Ataturk Airport.
Spoiler alert as we fly over the huge city of Istanbul on a beautiful sunny morning.
For those interested the landing in Istanbul is attached above.
A final right turn over the Sea of Marmara and we line up with Runway 05
We touch down in Istanbul Ataturk International Airport on time. The landing was in my opinion a bit rough but overall good job by the pilots in getting us safely to our destination.
After vacating Runway 05 we made our way to our gate. Considering this is Ataturk Airport there is no surprise that we got a remote stand. Seriously I'm so glad Istanbul has got a new airport cause quite frankly the old one was operating way over is capacity limit and extremely overcrowded.
We park at our remote stand and this brings is to the end of this flight report.
Farewell TC-JIR
Very nice report, thanks for sharing! I've flew couple of times with TK and I had the same meal twice: on 2014 on a flight from Addis Abeba to Istanbul, and in 2015 on a Barcelona-Istanbul morning flight. Looks like the breakfast is not changing, but anyway, the quality is very good compared to other airlines breakfast such as LH or KLM.
Is TK still operating A330 on their routes to Pakistan? Or they are using also 738 on low seasons?
Thank you for reading ? I see you have also experienced the same breakfast like me ? but ya I agree the quality is good . TK operate a mix of a332s and a333s to the 3 destinations they fly to in Pakistan all year around , although for a short span of time the 739 was operating the khi flight back in 2015✈️
Just took this flight a few months back, the crew were noticeably more cranky compared to the US bound flights. They still send these ex-TAM A332 to Pakistan time to time. They changed the catering up a bit. Now for KHI - IST they offer a Turkish pastry 'burek' with spinach and mushrooms. The side is a oily eggplant starter and desert was a chocolate cake. I found the meal to be more filling this time around but the removal of the cheese and olive starter was likely a cost cutting move. They also had a second option of vegetarian upma but both options are veg overall.
Before landing they did a second service of drinks and a chocolate vanilla (marble) cake. I do like these older A332 aircrafts as the seat is still quite comfortable compared to the newer seats on their 787.