Hello peoples of IFC!
Back on the 17th of March, me and my family had taken a long awaited trip. We’d be flying from my home area up to Seattle, then catching a second flight to Kona.
Initially our flight was going to be operated by a 737-900ER, however (for reasons I don’t really know) it was delayed something like 40 minutes from the original departure time. I didn’t really mind though, as it meant I could stay pasted at the window for a bit longer. Soon enough a surprise rolled up to our gate:
N932AK rolled up, a signal that Alaska swapped our plane out for the third time. I didn’t complain though. It was a change from the 737-800s I had been on for the past 3 Hawaii trips I had been on.
Seated at 26A, awaiting the flight to get going
Once we were pushed back and getting our engines started, I witnessed something I’ve only seen on videos: a smoky engine start.
And around 10 minutes later we rotated into the cloudy Washington skies. I waited 6 whole years for that.
In what felt like no time at all, we punched through the clouds, never to see land again for the next 5 and a half hours (give or take 10 minutes or so)
First glimpse of the ocean below, some 30 minutes in to the flight.
In a time that went by faster than I thought it would, we began turning in towards the Big Island.
Flying over Maui on our approach
Currently South-West of the airport, coming in for a landing on runway 35.
Some 6 hours later, we touched down on the runway.
Beautiful low res image I captured, on my 7 year old iPhone 6s, of the plane as I walked away, bringing an end to my second commercial flight of the day, and my first jet powered flight in over half a decade.
Thanks for stopping by peoples of IFC! I may make some other topics of my other 3 flights, if this one makes it up.
Side Note: some of the photo resolutions vary from the others since I had to take screen shots of those moments from the videos I uploaded of the flight.