Brussels-Mallorca with Thomas Cook

MD-11 · Post by **MD-11** » 27 Aug 2005, 09:24

On August 17 we flew to PMI with Thomas Cook.
I woke up at around 4AM. At 4:45 AM a minibus picked us up and drove to BRU.
We arrived just before 5AM but it was very busy at the drop off point.
Seemed that a lot of people were in need of vacation 8)
We had to check-in at row 11 in the old terminal.
Three desks were used for this flight but one of them was for premium pax.
But since the check-in agent there had not much work she called us to her.

So we were checked in fast, we got ( I asked ) for seats 29 A and B and
30 A and B.
At the security check I was handsearched because the metaldetecor beeped.
It had to be the metal buttons of my pants since I wasn't wearing anything else of metal.
Boarding was at gate A72, the most remote gate of the "new" A pier.
Our "bus" would be OO-TCK.
Boarding started with rows 16 to 30 so we were with the first to get on board. All leather seats were filled and at 6:58 safety briefing and pushback began.

Here the FA is asking which one of the pax has lost his underwear.

No he's showing how to use the seatbelt.

The sun was just in time to make pics 8)
After a few minues we were lined up on RWY25R behind a VEX B737.
We took off with a weight of 66.7 tons of which 8.3tons fuel. Our rotate speed was 146 kts. The flight distance at that point was 754NM.

We made a CIV ( Chievres ) 9C departure and were assigned FL 370 in cruise.

We had nice flying weather with only some light turbulence over the Pyrennee mountains which were covered in clouds.

Breakfast was served 30 minutes after take-off and was followed by two times coffee and tea and the tax free sale.
During descent we got a thomas cook candy.

During descent we had to fly through some clouds and at least we got some nice "luchtzakken"

.

We made a KENAS 1P arrival into LEPA towards RWY 24R.

We flew over the harbour of La Palma after a big turn over the sea.

We landed at PMI right on schedule with a weight of 61.6 tons so we used 5.1 tons of fuel.

OO-TCK as seen from the airbridge.
We had to make a rather long walk to the bagage belt but had our suitcases fast and went to the bus for the transfer to the hotel.
For most people the vacation was begun.
Mine started when we arrived at the airport in BRU

Comet · Post by **Comet** » 27 Aug 2005, 09:49

Great report Bart, love the technical details. That cloud certainly looked "iffy"! The snack looks very similar to the one I had on VLM between LCY and ANR back in 2003. Hope you enjoyed your holiday.

MSS658 · Post by **MSS658** » 27 Aug 2005, 18:48

nice report

Humberside · Post by **Humberside** » 27 Aug 2005, 19:38

Nice report and pics

cherdt · Post by **cherdt** » 27 Aug 2005, 20:23

Superb report ! ! ! Really great

But how do you know all these details? Like the departure route etc....

Chris

sab319 · Post by **sab319** » 27 Aug 2005, 21:08

nice report!!

MD-11 · Post by **MD-11** » 27 Aug 2005, 21:19

cherdt wrote: But how do you know all these details? Like the departure route etc....

I always give the FA a blanco paper where I've prepared the info I want. I ask her to give it to the flightcrew. They only have to fill in the readings from their instruments.
Most of the time they do so. I even have the name of the flightcrew but I like to keep that part to me for understandable reasons.

Post by **sn26567** » 28 Aug 2005, 10:01

Again a nice report, Bart.

MD-11 wrote:I even have the name of the flightcrew but I like to keep that part to me for understandable reasons.

I think that the crew would like it to be commended publicly. There is nothing wrong or illegal in giving flight data! Furthermore, with the information you give about the flight, the crew can be easily identified.

B744skipper · Post by **B744skipper** » 29 Aug 2005, 19:46

Interesting and detailed report, thanks for sharing it with us!

MD-11 wrote:I always give the FA a blanco paper where I've prepared the info I want. I ask her to give it to the flightcrew. They only have to fill in the readings from their instruments.

Could you post the blanco version of that paper here?

MD-11 · Post by **MD-11** » 29 Aug 2005, 20:12

The paper I give contains the following

Type of plane - EGT
Registration - FL
Seat ( where I sit ) - Mach speed
Zero fuel weight - Wind °/ kts
Take-off weight - OAT
SID - TAT
V1 - STAR
Vr - Landing weight
V2 - Vref
IAS - N1
GS - N2
TAS - Name captain
Fuel flow - Name first officer
(Name 2nd officer ) -> some long
haul flights
Everytime I asked it the crew filled in all the info.
I just give it to the FA during boarding and I ask her to give it to the flightcrew. I always add a small paper for the captain with the reason of this paper. I just write that I'm an aviation enthusiast.
Sometimes not all info is filled in on some short and busy routes.
I tried to make 2 seperate colums but in the topic everything appears next to each other

So to make it a little bit more clear I put a - between the rows.
To make it clear first read the left colum and than the right one.
Print this off your PC make some copies off it and put it in your hand luggage.
I once gave one paper like this to my neece when she flew BRU-JFK with Delta and even in the 9/11 era they filled in all details, so nothing wrong with it.
Good luck. 8)

teddybAIR · Post by **teddybAIR** » 29 Aug 2005, 20:59

Nice report!

And yeah, it is a long walk to the luggage belt at PMI! They always do this at Palma: the Belgian airplanes get the gates at the very end of the terminal. Did you notice how many Air Berlin aircraft (mainly 737's) are usually present at PMI?

Once again thx for the nice report!

bAIR

B744skipper · Post by **B744skipper** » 29 Aug 2005, 21:39

Thanks for sharing the list with me MD-11, I also use to give a log to the crew to fill it out for me, until now I had always very nice responses. I hope you don't mind that I will use some of your list to use on my list, it's always good to broaden ones horizon!

I do have a question left, what do the next terms mean:

EGT
Zero fuel weight
OAT
SID
TAT
STAR
Vr
V2
Vref
IAS
N1
GS
N2
TAS

These questions may sound silly, but I hope that you don't mind answering them.

Thanks in advance.

MD-11 · Post by **MD-11** » 29 Aug 2005, 23:00

EGT= Exhaust Gas Temperature
Zero Fuel Weight= weight of the plane with pax but without fuel
So if you know the TOW ( take off weight you know how much fuel is on board )
OAT= Outside Air Temperature
TAT= Total Air Temperature ( Let's say at 37000 feet the OAT is minus 54°C but since the plane flies through the air it causes friction and the plane heats up so the TAT is for example minus 20°C )
SID= Standard Instrument Departure ( a specific departure route which has to be flown at take-off )
STAR= STandard ARrival ( same as above but for landings )
Vr= Rotate speed
V2= Minimum safety speed one engine out
Vref= final approach speed
IAS=Indiacted Air Speed
GS= Ground Speed ( the speed in relation to the ground )
TAS= True Air Speed ( has to do with wind etc. )
N1 and N2 is in percentages for example 88.2% is the speed of the turbines ( inner and outer ) You can compare this with the rpm of your car.

MD-11 · Post by **MD-11** » 29 Aug 2005, 23:02

teddybAIR wrote: Did you notice how many Air Berlin aircraft (mainly 737's) are usually present at PMI?

Indeed, when we left PMI there were two Air Berlins next to each other.
But there were also a lot of Germans in the hotel too.

sab319 · Post by **sab319** » 30 Aug 2005, 10:45

MD-11 wrote:
teddybAIR wrote: Did you notice how many Air Berlin aircraft (mainly 737's) are usually present at PMI?
Indeed, when we left PMI there were two Air Berlins next to each other.
But there were also a lot of Germans in the hotel too.

I think I saw about 4 or 5 next to each other and about a total of 10 landing...