Returning to the West Coast on Aer Lingus’s primary long-haul aircraft today, the A330-300. Service between Dublin and San Francisco resumed in 2014 after a five-year hiatus, using the same equipment as before, the Airbus A330-200. In recent years, traffic between the Bay Area and Dublin has increased to the extent that the larger A330-300 has been deployed on the route, though the smaller, lower-capacity A330-200s still show up now and again. This is going to be our second long-haul flight with Aer Lingus and the first one in economy. Enjoy!
Server: Solo
Airline: Aer Lingus
Aircraft: Airbus A330-300
Origin: Dublin Airport, Collinstown, Ireland (DUB)
Destination: San Francisco International Airport, San Francisco, California (SFO)
Flight Number: EI61
Route: EIDW-KSFO
Seat: 24K (Economy)
Time En Route: 10 Hours 4 Minutes
At the bottom of an airstair at Stand 411, waiting to board. Due to transatlantic raffic in and out of DUB occasionally exceeding the capacity of Terminal 3, flights across the Pond sometimes board at the remote stands. While we’ve boarded many an aircraft via an airstair before, it’s still something of a new experience for us when it comes to long-haul, widebody ones. As evinced by the name on the nose, our aircraft for this transatlantic trip is EI-EIN, named “St Dallan/Dallan”, after the Irish poet, who wrote the “Amrum Coluim Chille” (“Elegy of Saint Columba”), who in turn is the namesake of the A330-200 we first came to the Emerald Isle on from Boston.
We’ve got a relatively quick taxi to the runway this afternoon. Terminal 3 is predictably busy as the Northern Summer travel season starts, with the south side of the terminal being full up with company A321LRs and an A330-200. As for our seat, it’s fairly comfortable, similar to the ones in economy on Delta, which is encouraging for us.
Getting airborne into a bright blue Irish sky from Runway 28. Projected flight time is just a hair over 10 hours, with little to no turbulence expected. Looks like another smooth flight ahead for us!
Climbing over County Longford. As we pass through 21,000 feet, the cabin crew comes around to get drink orders. We’ll be having a soft drink to keep our taste buds sharp several miles up.
Cruising over Baffin Bay at 34,000 feet after finishing up lunch and just before settling in for a brief mid-flight map. Food was pretty good, although somewhat generic in terms of the offerings. Still, though, it’s going to be more than satisfactory for a 10-hour flight.
Over southeastern Montana after waking up from our nap about an hour ago. Sleeping in economy class, at least for a short duration, was better than we expected. We’re feeling very well-rested for our arrival in San Francisco.
In a gradual descent over Yuba County, just west of the Sierra Nevada. According to the flightplan we looked up, we’re descending directly over Beale Air Force Base, home to the United State Air Force’s 9th Reconnaissance Wing (formerly the 9th Strategic Reconnaissance Wing), operating the Lockheed Martin U-2S Dragon Lady. The U-2 has a storied history in NorCal, dating back to the Air Force’s acquisition of the U-2R in the late 1960s as a complement to the 9th SAM’S SR-71A Blackbirds. NASA also operated a number of the type from its Ames facility at Moffett Field near San Jose, with one example, U-2C 56-6681 (NASA 708) on display there. Additionally, NASA also operated the ER-2 from Ames until operations were moved south to the Armstrong Flight Research Center. The Dragon Lady remains a somewhat frequent sight in the skies over Northern California, as the Air Force U-2 fleet remains very much in demand as a high-altitude, long-range photography and sensor platform, and the ER-2s still occasionally visit Ames. Sadly, it doesn’t look like any of the dark blue-black aircraft are in the pattern today.
Mid-afternoon arrival in San Francisco on Runway 28L. The airport’s VORTAC, off to the left, is just about to pass by. We’ve arrived during the middle of the rush of European arrivals.
Coming around the corner of Terminal 1 as we taxi to our gate. As usual, T1 is a medley of American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, and JetBlue tails, with a couple Hawaiian Airlines ones thrown in for good measure. After four flights with EI, our journey is almost over.
Getting a final view of our aircraft after deplaning at Gate B5. While it took us a while to get around to flying on Aer Lingus, we’re definitely glad we did. Everything about the Irish flag carrier, even in economy, felt above what we’d have expected, as if the airline was trying that much harder to be ahead of the competition. When we make our next journey to Ireland, we’ll definitely keep it under serious consideration.
