#65 out of 94 Airlines A minimum of 10 flight-reports within the past two years is required to appear in the rankings.
596 reviews
Greetings everyone! After arriving from Salt Lake City, Utah on a previous AA flight, we had an overnight layover in Miami. I had planned to stay a night in the city as I've done so in the past whenever I had an overnight layover as this one. But after thinking about it very carefully I decided it wasn't worth spending $250 for the night to only stay there for about 9 hours as my flight was departing at 8:36a the next morning. Not to mention that this particular night when checking hotel rates, everywhere in the city it was astronomically expensive for whatever reason.
Long story short I ultimately decided stay overnight at the airport and ride out the night there. Right after getting off my previous flight I headed to Wendy's, grabbed a burger and a soda and called it a night ;)
After a few hours sleeping at an airport bench, It was an hour before boarding and started making my way to my gate.
When arriving at the gate I noticed something peculiar. It was about 30 minutes before boarding and there was practically no one in the gate area. I found it odd as my flight was going to be operated by an A319 so there should be a good amount of people at least at the gate area going to Honduras this morning. There were flights departing for Guatemala City & San Salvador nearby and both their gate areas were full of people.
Boarding started on time and we were making our way down the jet bridge.
Some information about my plane:
Flight number: AA961
Aircraft: Airbus A319-112
Registration: N703UW
Delivered: October 1998
Since I had a main cabin ticket I was able to choose a window seat in my preferred location just aft of the wing ;)
Here's my seat 24F
This was a great seat choice as it practically came with 2 windows ?
My view for the next 2 hours!
Legroom was good, I believe AA offers 30" of pitch in main cabin.
Unlike my last flight on the A321, there weren't individual usb ports available at each seat on this A319. However, there were universal power outlets available. (2 per 3 seats)
Next to us is an AA Boeing 737-800 departing for Guatemala City
American Airlines A319 departing for Nassau
American Airlines A321 departing for Charlotte
Aerolineas Argentinas A330-200 departing for Buenos Aires
American Airlines Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner arriving from Dallas/Forth Worth
Boarding is complete. There was a reason why the boarding area was practically empty. There are only 32 of us traveling on this Airbus A319 to Honduras this morning! Which makes it a load factor of just 25%. I was sitting row 24 and there were 3 more rows of seats behind me and there was only one other passenger sitting behind us.
A look at the headrest
We ultimately pushed back about 1.5 hr behind schedule due to technical issue but luckily we still made it out!
Close handshake between our A319 and a passing B737 ?
You can check out the complete pushback and takeoff here:
Taking off runway 8R
Flying over Florida Bay
Overseas Highway that connects Key West with mainland Florida
Making myself comfortable ;)
A look at the tray table & seat back contents
Reached the coast of Cuba
Havana, Cuba
Inflight service started about 45 minutes into flight. The crew in this particular flight were very friendly and outgoing. This time again I requested a coffee and coke and the FA very gladly gave them to me (Unlike my previous flight). Since this was a morning flight, everyone got a biscoff cookie as a snack.
Flying over Isle of Youth, Cuba
Shortly after the FA passed out this deescalation form that needed to be filled out.
Here's a look at the loo. Just your typical airplane bathroom, but at least it was clean!
Flying over the island of Roatan, Honduras
Beginning our initial descent
Flying over Tegucigalpa, Honduras
It's sad they closed the notorious Toncontin airport located in the heart of the city in Dec. 2021. They closed the airport due to supposedly being dangerous and not being able to accommodate large aircraft. But most of my relatives living there all told be it was a political stunt by the last president of Honduras. This airpot did have it's perks, for one it was very convenient if you're staying near the city and two for it's crazy fun approach into the airport. This new airport that I'll be landing into (Palmerola Airport XPL) is a relatively new and opened in later 2021 and has it's good facilities however it's an 1.5-2h drive each way to & from the capital which in my opinion is an inconvenient long drive.
Luckily I was able to enjoy this landing into Toncontin airport a week before it's closure back in 2021. I'll attach the landing video below:
You can enjoy the full descent, landing & taxi video below:
Landing on runway 35
We managed to make up a huge chunk of the delay in the air and now only arriving 40 minutes behind schedule.
It was about 12 noon and it was odd to see we were the only aircraft here at the terminal when in the past I would usually see two or three other aircraft here at least. I assume the demand isn't there to be serving here from other airlines I guess given our light load on our aircraft ?♂️
One last look at my seat. You can tell I made use of my two windows ?
Enter text here…
Here's a last look at our 24 year old A319 (N703UW). Here's to another 24! maybe.. haha
This concludes my journey from Salt Lake City to Comayagua, thanks for reading :)
This was a great flight on American Airlines. The seats were very comfortable and snack + drinks were sufficient for a flight of this length. But once again this flight lacked an IFE system that would have enhanced the experience (this is what happens when you're used to flying with Delta haha). Not to mention that the extremely light load helped with comfort and making it seem almost as if you're flying on a private jet which is very rare given the high demand for travel now in days. Lastly the crew on this flight were simply great & caring and did show like they really wanted to be there despite the 1.5hr delay leaving Miami. This is a perfect example about a hit or miss when it comes to AA crew. My last flight was actually quite the contrast and the crew on my previous flight from SLC to MIA showed signs that they didn't want to be bothered and rushed thru the only service on a 4 hour flight. It's ashame that this inconsistency exists amongst cabin crew in this airline especially since they carry the name 'American'. I for one don't think they represent American hospitality to be holding that name unlike its competitor Delta.
4 Comments
Login to post a comment.