On April 6th, 2019, Istanbul’s Atatürk Airport closed permanently to commercial flights, after years of increasing passenger numbers to the Turkish capital. A new airport was needed to accommodate them and support the expansion of Turkey’s flag carrier, Turkish Airlines. Since the mid-2010s, the airline has been expanding rapidly, adding flights not only to its traditional strongholds of Europe and Asia, but also expanding North American services and introducing flights to South America, Australia, and New Zealand. These new long-haul services are built on a 3-type backbone: The Boeing 777-300ER, the Airbus A350-900, soon to be joined by an ultra-long-haul variant of the A350-1000, and the Boeing 787-9 Dreamliner. Together, these airplanes have transformed Istanbul from yet another one of Europe’s major airports into a hub for global connections.
Server: Solo
Airline: Turkish Airlines
Aircraft: Boeing 777-300ER
Origin: Washington Dulles International Airport, Dulles, Virginia (IAD)
Destination: Istanbul Airport, Arnavutköy, Turkey (IST)
Flight Number: TK8
Route: KIAD-LTFM
Seat: 53K (Economy)
Time En Route: 9 Hours 45 Minutes
First time flying to Turkey! Turkish Airlines has two daily flights out of Dulles to Istanbul, TK188 in the early afternoon, operated by a 787-9, and TK8, operated by a 777-300ER. Got to hang around TK’s popular lounge, just across from the gate.
Bit of a hike to the rearmost row of one of the longest airliners in the world. Despite this being an economy seat, there’s only two of them in this row, and the aisle seat was unoccupied, giving an extra bit of privacy.
Departure from Dulles
Waking up for a few minutes just in time to see our wing silhouetted against the dawn
Reaching Normandy after a few more hours of sleep. So far, service has been excellent, what little of it has been enjoyed due to sleeping most of the way across the Atlantic, with the cabin crew being very considerate of sleeping passengers. Those of them who weren’t getting some shut-eye themselves off-duty, at least.
Cruising over Croatia, almost directly over Zagreb, to be precise.
Descending into the Istanbul area
Landing in the early afternoon at IST
Taxiing to Concourse D. Istanbul has 7 concourses to support Turkish Airlines’s enornmous network, with international flights using Concourses A through F.
Deplaned at the D Gates. Our aircraft, registered as TC-JJL and named Karadeniz after Turkey’s Black Sea Region, is getting readied to depart in an hour and a half as TK9 to Los Angeles.