All Nippon Airways’s longest route, between Tokyo’s Narita Airport and Mexico City, isn’t flown by what you thought it might be. It isn’t flown by the long-legged 787-9. Nor by the mighty 777-300ER, ANAs versions of which have one of the lowest seating densities for the type. No, the longest flight All Nippon Airways flies is flown on the humble 787-8, a type that is rarely flown by the airline outside of East Asia and Oceania, except on a few flights to the United States (HND-SEA, HND-LAX, and until last year or so HND-IAH).
Server: Solo
Airline: All Nippon Airways
Aircraft: Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner
Origin: Narita International Airport, Narita, Japan (NRT)
Destination: Benito Juárez International Airport, Mexico City, Mexico (MEX)
Flight Number: NH180
Route: RJAA-MMMX
Seat: 7K (Business)
Time En Route: 12 Hours 47 Minutes
Waiting to board our aircraft at Narita. All Nippon is the launch customer for Boeing’s shortest Dreamliner, first receiving the type in 2011. Since then, they’ve replaced older widebodies on domestic routes and pioneered new international ones, ranging as far afield as Brussels, Perth, Los Angeles, Seattle, Houston, and yes, Mexico City.
Taxiing for takeoff and seated in a superb business class seat, albeit one that’s starting to show its age.
Screaming Trent 1000 departure off of Runway 16R
Climbing over the Pacific
Sun going down as we head east
After a very relaxing, quiet night over the Pacific, we’re cruising down California. Here, Los Angeles is visible to the west.
At the northern end of the Gulf of California
Final descent into the Valley of Mexico
Landing on a hot day in Mexico City
Parked at Terminal 1, with the volcanoes Popocatépetl (The Smoking Mountain) and Iztaccíhuatl (The White Lady) in the background. Mexico City and the Valley of Mexico are surrounded by volcanoes and mountains, as part of the Trans-Mexican Volcanic Belt, part of the larger Ring of Fire.