jlemon

Indeed. After all these years, I still remember the meal service in coach on board an American 707 (or was it a 720B?) from LAX nonstop to Memphis. It was 1965 and only my third airline flight (my first airline experience as a kid was a roundtrip journey via PSA from LAX to SFO and back on board the L-188 Electra). AA served us a substantial lunch.

Fast forward to the present. One of my more recent experiences was an LFT - DFW - LHR roundtrip on American with a 777-323ER being operated between Dallas/Fort Worth and London. I was able to use my AAdvantage miles for award travel and traveled in F on the stretched 777. There are only eight seats in the F cabin on the AA 77W and IMHO the seat was more comfortable than the business class seats on the same aircraft. I was in 2J and discovered the seat was capable of swiveling to face the windows. Very nice and I have the feeling the first class seats on this airplane are quite a bit better than what AA originally offered in F with regard to seating on its first narrow body Boeings.

However, American has since announced they will be removing the first class cabin on their 777-323ER aircraft and will thus no longer be offering international F service - international business class cabins on all of their 777 and 787 airplanes are the best you're gonna get in the future. But for the time being, AA is still operating the 77W with a first class cabin and this equipment does show up on a few of their domestic flights from time to time with both the first and business class cabins being priced at the same domestic first class fare. So this November, we will travel on a 777-323ER from DFW to MIA as we make our way down to the Cayman Islands. I'll be back in seat 2J and my wife will be in seat 1J. We are looking forward to viewing the sunset over the Gulf of Mexico from our window seats as this will most likely be the last time we'll have the opportunity to fly in the first class cabin on the AA operated 77W. And I'll be sure to report on what we were served for dinner following our flight from Dallas/Fort Worth to Miami.

https://www.airliners.net/photo/Amer...3-ER/2654294/L

WHBM

I can only add that this was a standard serving at UK school dinners a generation back ...

jlemon

Ah, but what was it that Mr. Gilmour and Mr. Waters said about the pudding.....

joejones

How much cigarette smoke did you get with that lunch, though?

jlemon

I honestly do not remember any cigarette smoke on that American flight from LAX to MEM back in 1965.

However, I certainly remember the dense cloud of cigarette smoke in the back of a 727-200 on an Eastern flight from Barbados nonstop to Miami many years later. This EA service had originated in Port of Spain and just about all of the folks who had boarded at POS were puffing away like mad. It wasn't a fun experience.

WHBM

Some things never change. Sat in departures at London City headed for Dublin, My BA E190 still in Amsterdam. Will I get away before it closes ? Been doing this last Dublin of the day since 1991 I think, when it was an old (even then) BAe146-100 of CityJet.

Seat 2A

I may be wrong here, but I seem to recall a time in the early 1960s when there wasn't a "No Smoking" section at all. People just smoked wherever they sat. I also remember when the stewardesses came around with trays bearing small packs (maybe 5 cigs) of complimentary cigarettes. It seemed like about 65% of Americans smoked back then.

I might add that as a kid, I don't remember being bothered by cigarette smoke on airplanes. That seems a bit surprising today when you think that once upon a time the last six or seven rows of Economy on a 727 sized aircraft were reserved for smokers. That means about 36-42 seats on a full flight, most all of whom lit up as soon as the No Smoking sign was extinguished - being as they hadn't lit up for about 45 minutes since boarding.

These days, watching the amount of smoke a single smoker exhales with just one puff, it's a wonder I didn't notice it more.

jrl767

my first business trips in the fall of 1976 were LAX<>PHX on a Continental 72S … CO was operating three-class (F/Y/K, First/Coach/Economy) with the main cabin split: K smoking was in the bulkhead row (i.e., adjacent to the last row of F which was the smoking section), and non-smoking was the two or three rows ahead of the aft door

Y non-smoking was the majority of the main cabin, and smoking was all the way in the back, between the aft door and the lav

WHBM

Interesting sidebar. My first actual business trip was I think 1981, BA One-Eleven, Manchester to Glasgow. The aircraft was through from Berlin and Hanover, and there was a little-known side door and corridor in the old Manchester Airport terminal to take domestic passengers through to a gate in the International side. It was a bit of an excitement to actually have your ticket paid for by someone else.

A few months later I found that the office accountant had what BA called "Timesaver" tickets, pre-serialled but blank, which were good for a Manchester to Heathrow (and vice-versa) Shuttle journey. They were invoiced only when used to the central corporate account. The accountant kept them locked in the petty cash tin, however you could ask for one when he knew you were going to London. They were an interesting form of ticketing, you just exchanged them for a boarding card at Shuttle check-in.

One wonders how all those BA Shuttle business travellers disappeared. There was a longstanding fiction that Manchester to Heathrow, and the major Scottish routes, were for mainly connections to BA international flights. It was guite apparent that the majority of passengers were just travelling domestic, and indeed it was sometimes apparent that a few were returning on the same aircraft, after exchanging important documents in the destination terminal.

jlemon

I believe Muse Air was the first U.S. based air carrier operating mainline jet equipment to institute a no smoking policy on all of their flights. It was a real breath of fresh air, so to speak, and I enjoyed flying with them between Texas and southern California a number of times.

jlemon

I also wonder what happened to the O & D passenger traffic between Burbank and San Diego.

Back in the 1970's, PSA was operating 727-200 service between BUR and SAN with a number of flights a day and the load factors were healthy. And in 1975, the one way fare was less than twelve bucks ($11.65).

Xyzzy

Speaking of smoking, I recall an IB flight where the smking section was on one side of the aisle and the non-smoking section was the other side -- the entire length of the aircraft. Blech!

jlemon

Definitely no bueno, Senor!

MADPhil

I recall it being argued that the longitudinal air flow meant that this actually resulted in the non-smokers getting less smoke. If this was true and you had roughly equal numbers then it made sense. It made much more sense from a health and safety point of view to eliminate on-board smoking

Seat 2A

Anybody happen to know if smoking is still allowed on any IATA carrier? I'd heard that smoking was still allowed on Cubana and a couple of African carriers. That is to say it is either allowed or the ban is not enforced.