After a few days spent in Los Angeles, it was time to fly to Kahului with Delta on the Boeing 757-200.
Interesting to read the aircraft history of this 25 year old 757, N543US. Seems this frame was the one damaged during a hard landing in Ponta Delgada in August 2019. Good to see the fuselage creases have since been ironed out!
Boarding was on time and looked like a very full flight. I was added to the First Class upgrade list due to my KLM Platinum status but soon realised I kept getting pushed to the bottom of the list, so didn’t hold much hope of that happening. I wasn’t able to add my boarding pass to my Apple Wallet collection either, just kept receiving an error message. Once onboard, the flight was indeed very full and the airframe was also showing its age.
I settled in to seat 24A in Economy for the estimated flight time of 5 hours and 20 minutes, an initial cruising altitude of 35,000ft and expected smooth flying conditions for most of the way to Kahului.
Main cabin door was closed and we began pushing back and made our way to runway 24L.
It had been a while since I experienced a takeoff on the 757 and thankfully, it didn’t disappoint. A powerful and steep climb out over the Pacific.
Inflight entertainment screens seemed a bit dated, unsure if all Delta 757s have these older monitors. Despite this, they contained a good selection of movies and TV shows. Wifi was also available and I made use of the free messaging service. A pass for one hour was priced $6.95 and the full flight would cost $21.95. I just used the free messaging.
Flight attendants came into the aisle with drinks and snacks which consisted of a small chocolate, cherry and almond bar and a pack of salted almonds. I had a coffee and apple juice. Alcoholic drinks were available to purchase for $8/9, also a few sandwich options and snack boxes.
Watched a few movies and noticed that similarly to KLM, most of the audio CDs on Delta have been removed in place of podcast type playlists. I much prefer being able to create my own playlists on board.
Another drinks round was completed before landing and we began our descent and approach into Kahului.
Thanks for sharing this report, but that catering is just poor. A few snacks for a six hour flight is unacceptable for a legacy carrier.
I've always loved 757s (probably because my first job was with Icelandair when I was 17). I'm glad DL keep them around with so many other carriers having retired them. DL's cabin interiors are usually so fresh and new, so it's surprising to see this older cabin with the tiny IFE screens still flying around. Nevertherless, still better than the competition flying standard domestic metal with no PTVs on most West Coast to Hawaii routes.
Pre-pandemic US carriers were beginning to roll out free meals on long transcon flights and mainland to Hawaii...but then Covid happened. Hawaiian were the only to bring this back so far. Hopefully we'll continue to see improvement on these very long domestic flights.
Thanks for sharing and hope you enjoyed Hawaii! I'm thinking of booking a trip there myself since it's not terribly far now that I live on the West Coast.