Review of Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt to Raleigh in Economy

Welcome to the final report of my European adventure. Today, I will be flying Lufthansa's A330-300 from Frankfurt to Raleigh-Durham.

FRA Airport

After getting off an A321-100 from Athens, I don't have a lot of time to catch my flight to RDU. I'd love to watch all of the quadjets at FRA, but I have to catch my flight.

I made it to the gate.

Boarding

Boarding will be done via bus.

But, that bus is to take the passengers to a jetway.

Here's the plane taking me to RDU today: a 2012-built Airbus A330-300, registered D-AIKR, and named "Oldenburg". If that sounds familiar, that's because it's the same aircraft I flew from RDU to Frankfurt. It was delivered new to Lufthansa on May 31, 2012, and it has flown with them since. This plane will be transferred to another LH Group airline (either 4Y or SN) in the next few years.

I don't think this has been erased since the last time I flew this bird.

Onboard

Business on Lufthansa's A330s feature 42 Collins Diamond seats in a 2-2-2 configuration.

The premium economy cabin features 28 ZIMmagic seats in a 2-3-2 configuration.

Economy, where I will be seated, features 185 seats (can't figure out the model) in a 2-4-2 configuration. I will be seated in 26K today.

I won't get too much into the IFE system, since I covered it in more detail in the first report of this series. But to summarize, it's a Panasonic eX2 in economy, which features a kinda clunky UI, combined with an older resistive touchscreen, making it a bad user experience.

My seat's headset jack was broken, so the crew transferred my seat neighbor to a different seat, giving me an entire row to myself!

The contents in the seatback included your standard safety card, air-sickness bag, and a shopping catalog.

As the crew had to restart the IFE, there was a live safety demo in place of a safety video.

Low-quality earbuds were handed out. I used my Sony headphones with an adapter for the two-prong headset jack instead.

Departure

Goodbye Frankfurt!

"Flight closed"? Yeah, right. The IFE was activated after takeoff.

In-flight

I moved to my other seat, and put all of the pillows and blankets on the empty seat.

I don't like the USB port location. It's under the armrest.

I will be trying out the meal service for once. It started with some salty crackers.

In the time between services, I checked the lavatory. It was in good, working order.

Over the UK.

Now for the main meal. The menu is shown below.

I went for the chicken, it was actually in BBQ sauce. A salad, a cake (which I didn't eat, since it appeared to have nuts), a cold bread roll with butter, and some cheese were on the side.

Metal cutlery!

The chicken is served with a side of mashed potatoes and broccoli. Not pictured, but I also got a Coke and a coffee with the meal.

The chicken was nicely cooked, and it was full of flavor! I enjoyed it!

Passing over Greenland, look at those stunning views!

An American Dreamliner is winning the race across the Atlantic, it's going faster than this A330.

A view of the rear economy cabin.

I got another coffee from the rear galley.

About an hour and 45 minutes prior to arrival, the lights turned on. The pre-arrival snack is ready!

It's a panini with gouda cheese, some curry sauce, and carrots.

It wasn't too bad. I had one last coffee, as well as a water to go with it.

To finish the service hot towelettes were handed out.

As the flight comes to an end, chocolates were handed out. However, they weren't the Lindt chocolates like on the intra-Europe flights.

Raleigh has come into view on the cockpit view of Flighpath3D!

Arrival

Descent has started, and flaps are down.

On approach to runway 23R! I've never seen it from this angle before!

Welcome to RDU!

That concludes my European adventure!

Some Delta planes as this A330 heads to the gate.

Time to get off! One last view of the premium/economy cabin.

And of the business cabin.

Someone added an S to "flight" on this graphic, and removed "RDU-FRA" since the last time I saw this.

One last photo of "Oldenburg".

And off to immigration!