Review of Sky Airline flight Santiago → Lima in Economy

Introduction 

 Hi and welcome to the return portion of my trip to Santiago. If you missed my previous report travelling in the other Chilean LCC, click here. 

I booked my flight back home on SKY Airline, the “friendlier” out of Chile’s two low cost carriers, as the price was right and the schedule convenient, as it would allow me to spend most of the day in Santiago and fly home in the evening. 

 SKY  started operations as a boutique carrier in 2002 if not mistaken, with a fleet of 2nd hand Boeing 737-200s. The airline's value proposition revolved around offering better onboard service than the competition, for example by offering complimentary meals in domestic flights. SKY would fly out to a handful of destinations within Chile and also to neighbouring destinations such as Lima, Peru; Buenos Aires, Argentina; Sao Paulo, Brazil and Montevideo, Uruguay. After Its founder jürgen Paulmann passed away in 2014, his successors decided to change the business model into a low cost carrier in order to ensure the airline could keep afloat in the long run.  The airline now operates a fleet of 28 A320neos and A321neos and proudly markets itself as having the newest aircraft fleet in America  by average aircraft age.

 The airline issued convertible bonds for US$100 million last year, as a vehicle to raise capital in order to navigate through the lags of the pandemic. Argentinian outlet Aviacionline points out  that Eliott management corporation has recently invested both in SKY and Avianca, which along with a series of hints suggests that some tighter form of collaboration between the two, should not be ruled out in the future. Anyways, lets jump to the flight experience.   

Santiago's airport new international terminal 

I was kindly dropped off at the airport three and a half hours before my 20:50 flight home, at Santiago's airport new terminal 2 which serves international flights. At first glance, the airport looks stunning. 

 Stupidly I had mistyped a number on my passport while checking in online the day before. Since I found no way of sorting this online, I had to queue in for check in. SKYs check in line was huge as there were two flights being checked in at the same time and only three members of staff on duty. Not feeling like stucking in line for too long, I splurged 6 US dollars and some cents on a "star pass" fee for priority check in and boarding, quickly using my phone. However, it probably wasn't the smartest idea as in the end it didn't make much of a difference anyway.  The priority check in line was running really slow as well and there were lots of passengers before me checking in lots of luggage. Before my turn the check in agent disappeared with some guy trying to check in a very large suitcase, leaving the desk unstaffed for some time. 

 Finally after forty five minutes in line I was able to get my case sorted within seconds and given a paper boarding pass at no extra charge. To the staff's credit, they were all very helpful with passengers and seemed to cope okay with passenger's frustration, without loosing their temper. I overheard there was an issue with staff attendance that day which was causing all this mess.

Santiago’s new international terminal is aesthetically impressive, however it lets down in some aspects when it comes to practicality. For starters, the check in area is not wide enough, meaning there is not enough space from the entrance doors to the check in counters. This already creates some congestion despite the terminal operating at under 50% capacity. At the same time, it leaves virtually no space to add new check in counters if required in the future. 

 The departures area is located behind the check in counters. In Chile you clear immigration before going through security. That area is wide and had lots of open desks so the process was quick. Security has that system where you pick up trays on a conveyor belt that runs beneath x-ray machine, which helps speed things up and allow three people to put their stuff at the same time.

Then it’s the classic duty free fashion before you get to the central concourse. The terminal has four gate wings, C,D,E and G, with two in each direction.

 There are some shops and restaurants in the central area, however outlets are spread out across the different gate wings too . There is no signage indicating what’s on each section, which  would be quite handy.

This outlet distribution is not ideal in an airport designed this way, because it makes passengers either walk a lot or miss places they would otherwise go to. For example, there is one McDonalds in the concourse located in wing C. If your flight leaves from any other wing, you have to make a 10 minute walk over there, only to walk back for another 10 or 15 minutes to go to your gate. Same with the Skyteam lounge located in wing E, if for some reason a Skyteam flight leaves from any other wing, it leaves passengers having to walk a lot just to go to the lounge. Instead congregating as many F&B/shopping places and lounges at the central concourse would make more sense, as everyone has to go through there before making their way to their gates.
 

 There is a priority pass lounge in concourse C,  as big as a shoebox, flooding with people queing to get in. Pass! 

Instead I thought about grabbing a glass of wine somewhere, however by the time I reached wing E, where my flight would depart from, there was not much time left before boarding. There was some action going on at the gate area with a LATAM A320 also bound for Lima 30 minutes before us and a United Boeing 787-9 headed to Houston. At this wing there were a couple of cafes and a SkyTeam lounge that is not yet open.

 The gate areas are wide, though seats do not feature power plugs or USB ports, which in 2022 is unacceptable. Instead there are a few power plugs dotted around the area with some shelves for passengers to leave their devices charging.

At the far edge of each wing there is a children's play area. 

 My flight started boarding forty minutes before departure. Since I had priority boarding, I could at least get into the holding pen in no time. We were then held for about 10 minutes at the jet bridge before the crew authorized boarding.

   
Our flight to Lima would take 3 and a half hours on board a 1 year old A320neo. Unfortunately I did not snap any shots of my aircraft, so I'll leave you with a fellow SKY A320neo spotted at SCL last year.     

  I sat down at my pre-booked seat 3A. I couldn’t help to notice that it felt slightly more uncomfortable than what I remembered. On the plus side all seats come with USB ports which is appreciated. As I looked for pictures from another flight I had with the airline, I couldn't help to notice how there seem to be at least three different seat types onboard SKYs A320neos.

SKYs three twenties are seat 186 passengers in a single class configuration. Seats between rows 1 and 3 are marketed as extra legroom. The bulkhead is definitely roomier, while seats in rows two and three have 32 inches of pitch. Regular seats have 28 inches of legroom. 

   
The flight was about 90% full with a few business travellers on sight on this sunday evening flight, which is nice to see. SKY promotes its business program quite a lot, which I guess can serve quite well those travelling domestically and/or regionally from Chile and Peru. Crew were very strict about not allowing anyone to change seats. One guy got into a bit of an argument after he was not allowed to move into an empty bulkhead seat. That guy had swapped seats with another guy seated in row 2 so that he could seat with his family which was sat further back, so the crew had to explain that was a one-off situation. 

 We pushed back on schedule and one could start to appreciate  SCLs new international  exterior architecture. We took off in now time and made our way towards Lima, with some nice aerial views of Santiago airport behind us as we climbed up.  

About an hour into the flight, flight attendants began buy on board onboard service handing out a printed menu to passengers wishing to partake. I was still fancying a glass of wine along with something to eat, but unfortunately SKY does not stock the former, so I had to go with beer then. The  flight attendant commented that if I were to add a snack to my meal it would come out cheaper. 

So I ended up with a chicken and mushroom wrap, a 450ml beer and a brownie for around 10 USD. One flight attendant was in charge of taking orders and charging ,  while the other one for delivering them.

After opening my can of beer, I realized that the flight attendant had not handed the one I ordered but decided not to bother as both were the same price anyways.  The chicken and mushroom wrap was quite nice and enough to fill me up. I believe the beer I was given is from a well known brewery in the southern city of Valdivia. It was good. 
 

I ended up dozing off after the meal service was done only to be woken up by the captain's announcement that we were beginning our descent into Lima. Seats do recline on SKY's A320neos, which is welcome. 

Before landing flight attendants made an announcement asking passengers to throw any remaining rubbish on their way out of the cabin. This is because the aircraft then goes straight back to Santiago without being deep cleaned in the middle. 

We landed on schedule and taxied towards our gate between a LATAM Boeing 767-300 which about to depart to Miami and an Aeromexico Boeing 737-800 to Mexico City. I still have to try out LATAMs retrofitted cabins in the Peru based 767s. 

Immigration was quick and easy and to my surprised there was virtually no queue. Travelling to Peru is straightforward now a days, with passengers only being required to fill in a pre-arrival health declaration from and have three vaccine doses for COVID (or two if you ver vaxxed with J&J). 

This is all from me for now. Thanks for reading.  

Bonus : Click here display hide

Santiago is a city I enjoy visiting quite a lot. It has some nice areas, and parks that which are enjoyable to walk. I did not do much standard tourism this time, but I'll leave some pictures of my walks around the Providencia, Vitacura and Las Condes areas. I only ventured into the city center once, which unfortunately feels a bit run down compared to some years ago, after protests in the last few years.