Review of Wizz Air flight Milan → London in Economy

Milan Malpensa

Having had an afternoon in the city of Milan, I opted to use the somewhat costly Malpensa Express to ensure that I could get to and from the Airport as best as possible, in order to ensure I had enough time to catch my flight home and not end up stuck in Italy. Overall its a nice service, all though it is a 45-50 minute journey and there can be quiet patches in the scheduling.

It cost me 20EUR (£17.40p) for a return journey in a day, booking this ticket at the Airport. I did however find the Metro tickets for within the city quite good value by comparison.

Its a short walk over to Terminal One where I would be flying from this evening, though the Milan Malpensa Airport train station is situated under the airport Terminal and is a short walk to either T1 or T2. 

Landside at departures in Terminal One is this massive window overlooking the Airport, allowing some amazing plane spotting opportunities, and can probably be very useful on days with bad weather, here are a selection of photos I snapped from those windows during that trip.

I eventually made my way airside, going through security at Milan Malpensa Airport, I noticed something peculiar that I hadn't seen before at other European airports… Passengers on flights to Israel and the USA had a small number of dedicated security lanes for themselves, whilst everyone else heading within Italy, Europe or elsewhere had to use the "All Flights" lanes. If anyone can enlighten me on this, I would be keen to hear why this is practised at Milan MXP?

Going airside I had a quick look around Duty Free, I then went for the B-Gates where the non-Schengen flights were leaving from. I didn't get a good photo of my Airbus A321 from the gate area we were at, but I did get a nice close up of a neighbouring Royal Air Maroc Boeing 737. It was interesting seeing Hudson Newsagents at Milan MXP, given I have only previously seen them in US Airports… I don't think they have any branches in the UK Airports as they are dominated by W.H Smith!

Wizzair W45788 (MXP-LGW)

My aircraft for this flight would be the Hungarian Wizzair Airbus A321ceo, HA-LTE, delivered to Wizzair (Hungary) in June 2018 as one of the first Airbus A321ceo in the fleet, having at the time being an all Airbus A320 airline from its 2003 inception until 2018. The flight was to be operated by the airlines newly formed Wizzair Malta, but this Hungarian aircraft was operating on behalf of the Maltese sister company.

Boarding began on time, and it seemed like we'd be enjoying a flight on the fully loaded side, as I do with budget airlines, I opted to sit back and relax before going on last. We did an open board on the Airbus A321-ceo, I didn't have far to go for my seat as I was seated in Seat 14F, which was right by the engine No.2. I did pay extra for the seat, but I don't recall the price, but from previous flights, I do know that Wizzair can be quite expensive on seat selection compare to Ryanair or easyJet.

We pushed back and had a prolong taxi around the airport passing Terminal 1 and Terminal 2, passing the Cargo Ramps seeing some classic delights light CargoLux Boeing 747-400s and DHL Airbus A300-600F. 

We eventually got around to Runway 35R, which was our departure runway, we had a short wait for a plane departing ahead of us, but soon it was our turn on the runway and we rocketed out of Milan MXP!

We took off and made our way North passing over Swiss airspace between Mount Blanc and Matterhorn, we then passed east of Geneva, before making a turn toward Dijon, once we passed that town we made our way to Paris before making the final stretch over the English Channel for England.

During the flight from my position on the plane, I got some good views of the Swiss mountain Matterhorn. Pretty good scenic views poking through the clouds above Switzerland!

The crew began their inflight service and they seemed to be getting quite a bit of demand from the passengers. I opted to enjoy a Wizzair exclusive chocolate bar alongside a can of Coca-Cola and a latte coffee supplied by Starbucks.

After enjoying my snack, I opted to nap again for a bit. The flight likely went uneventfully for a while until…

We began our initial decent over the English channel, we began circling a bit around Sussex, before finally coming into finals for London Gatwick, making our arrival onto Runway 26L, where I had departed from earlier that day!

After vacating the runway, we taxied down to the same pier we'd left off, the plane coming to a stop about half way down. Once we stopped, everyone seemed to be in a rush to leave the plane, I opted to sit down and wait for most of the people to leave and left the plane without feeling rushed or being pushed along with a crowd of anxious travellers behind me.

I thanked the cabin crew for a lovely flight before leaving, they had to reload with more passengers and return to Milan MXP, where they are based. I think this was the only rotation for this crew. I would be quite a late arrival back into Milan for them!

It was cool still seeing the stored I-DAVA, a McDonnell-Douglas MD-80 that was impounded at LGW. I don't know how much longer this plane has at London Gatwick until its eventually scrapped, but its nice to see an MD-80 at London Gatwick. I got through immigration within a few minutes, and with a good 2 hours until my coach back to Bournemouth Interchange, I went over to the Giraffe Restaurant for a quick dinner to fill me up for the rest of the evening. It was going to be a long ride home (about 3hr 40 min) after the two hour wait!