August 17th 2020:
That day was the first commercial flight of the new German airline Lübeck Air. The domestic flights are operated by the Danish airline Alsie Express, from Lübeck Air's base in Lübeck city. Destinations are Munich (2x/day) and Stuttgart (1x/day). Flights were already due to start in June 2020 but postponed to August 2020 due to the pandemic.
August 18th 2020:
Day that I chose to fly from Munich to Lübeck on the morning flight. I didn't want to fly on the evening flight since it takes place at night and Hamburg is my final destination, that I don't want to reach too late at night. This flight is part of my return trip from Greece.
Lübeck Air offers 3 different booking classes: Silver, Gold, Diamant. I paid 120 EUR in Silver class, which is similar to Economy Class. I bought the ticket roughly a week before the flight.
Flight routing
- 1HAM-CFU / Condor Airlines / A320-200 / Economy
- 2CFU-MUC / Condor Airlines / A320-200 / Economy
- 3MUC-LBC / Lübeck Air operated by Alsie Express / ATR-72-500 / Economy
I tried to check in online the day before departure. However when entering my booking data it failed displaying a "Booking not found" message. I was a bit worried, but my booking was still confirmed in "manage my booking".
The day before I was already at the airport since I flew back from Greece. I used this opportunity to go to the check-in agent of the Lübeck Air evening flight in order to see if it was possible to get my boarding pass. However the agent couldn't do it, but acknowledged that online check in was not available yet.
I stayed in a hotel near MUC airport and I arrived roughly 2:15 hours before the check-in's opening. I wanted to have enough possibilities to select my seat.
Lübeck Air wasn't added to the list of airlines operating at zone D yet.
Zone D was still pretty empty at this time of the day. Nobody was waiting in front of me when the check-in agent arrived.
The employee printed my boarding pass which displays the destination as "Hamburg/LBC" although there are at least 50 km between both cities. I selected seat 6A. I don't have any luggage to check in. Every Lübeck Air's booking class includes a hold baggage.
I have nothing else to do landside and decided to go airside. No waiting at the security check point.
The boarding area is quite empty and hardly any passengers. There are actually more airport staff than passengers in this area. One snack bar is open, but the rest is closed. It is possible to walk to other neighbouring boarding zones.
I was expecting our aircraft to arrive at a gate directly at the terminal however it was parked on a remote location behind the works on terminal 1's expansion.
Boarding for my flight was done on time at gate D05 and was quick.
There was a bus waiting for us downstairs. We were 10 passengers to head to the aircraft.
After a short ride we were at the aircraft which is SE-MDB. It displays a swedish registration from its previous owners Golden Air and Braathens Regional Airlines.
That's a picture of the aircraft that I took the day before on the evening flight rotation.
We had to wait at the bottom of the stairs.
The reason for that is that every passenger has to use hand sanitizer (fixed at the entrance, no picture).
Afterwards each passenger receives a health kit (picture taken at my seat). The straw is less expected in a health kit!
The cabin of this ATR-72 has been modified from the usual 72 seats to 60 seats.
The headrest is fix.
The seat pitch is excellent due to a lower number of seats and not only at the emergency exits.
Not only there is room for one's legs but on the side too. For now all seats are blocked.
The other side of the "blocked seat" card is sponsored by Lübeck Airport. This is the same logo on the aircraft's tail.
The PSU was adapted to fit each seat.
The top of the seat back contains the safety card.
Here is the safety card.
What's this in the seat back net?
It's a sickness bag.
The bag has graduations, in case someone wants to know precisely how much is inside!
There are also some instructions to use it.
We are ready for start and push back 15 minutes before our departure time. However we have to wait a little.
Finally, take off from the Southern runway.
Isar river.
A bit of rough air at the beginning of the flight.
Ingolstadt and Danube river.
At cruising altitude, an announcement was made for the meal which was free of charge and the selection of drinks was apparently limited. The tray table is not so large.
2 trolleys came from the back and I received a box that the flight attendant left on the right tray table. The selection of drinks was ranging from water to fruit juice. I didn't see any alcohol.
I chose grape juice and I didn't get a glass with it. This is the reason why there was a straw in the health kit!
Inside the box there were cold snacks, in detail we have:
Pretzel roll with salami, another with cheese
Pie (broccoli?) with Parma ham.
Fruit salad
Everything was good and fruits were not hard.
There was a wooden fork for the fruit salad. No plastic packaging for the meal. As a matter of fact, limiting the use of plastics is one of Lübeck Air's focus as they state on their website: "And we are taking a brand new path in air travel, doing without plastic and packaging wherever possible - showing that it can be done."
The flight attendant collected boxes. I was not done yet and she came back shortly after.
Descending towards LBC. Flying over Schaalsee.
Once landing at LBC we were welcomed by many ground staff. We had to wait in the plane to leave one after another.
A few luggage were unloaded from the front hold of the plane.
No IFE was available on the flight, thus here is the Flightradar24 flight path.
The terminal is not big but still brand new.
There was no commercial flights in this airport since 2016. It used to be called Hamburg Lübeck and was a secondary airport for Hamburg used by Ryanair and Wizzair. Now these airlines fly directly from Hamburg's main airport.
A small door and we are already inside the baggage claim area. It's brand new and looks like a storage area. I left this area quickly since I had no checked in luggage.
Some works are still ongoing in the terminal. Each individual ladies room has a sink and there is an unfinished wall.
In the terminal there are a restaurant (open), a store (closed) and an ATM.
The Check-in area is quiet for now. The next flight is to Stuttgart leaving at 1:00pm.
I left the terminal, the car park is directly in front of the terminal.
Unfortunately the observation deck built over the terminal was closed during my visit.
A train station stop is a few minutes away by walk.
I was waiting in the area is order to take a picture of the aircraft flying to STR.
Afterwards I headed to the airport bus stop, which is located in the main street.
The bus to the city centre runs every 30 minutes and costs 3.30 EUR. I didn't spend a lot of time in the city but it looked nice.
Wow, I wasn't expecting an ATR 72-500 cabin to be so nice inside! Very impressive legroom with only 60 seats and the meal service is very impressive for a short flight. And if I understand correctly, this is typical food service, not just because it was the first day of operations? It's basically a short-haul business class product without the blocked adjacent seat...granted, not many European carriers block the adjacent on a/c with 2-2 configurations. Very impressive, thanks so much for sharing! Beautiful photos as always
Thanks for this nice FR.
Very high level of service for economy class and nice looking plane & cabin.
Hope this venture is succesful and there are more than 10 passengers on avreage on their flights.
Looks like a quality operation! Hopefully it is sustainable..