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Delta Inaugural Detroit to Hong Kong flight on June 2, 2010
Introduction:
When Delta announced its intent to introduce a nonstop Detroit to Hong Kong flight using Boeing 777-200LR, I immediately tried to find an affordable way to join the inaugural flight, and as one of the longest schedule routes on Delta network, I was hoping for some fanfare. I ended up buying a complex RT ticket from CMB to YVR, and then YVR to YYZ, then DTW-HKG-CMB. This fare has discontinued, but I think I get an okay deal, considered the major detour to DTW. So with excitement, I arrived Detroit’s North Terminal via Southwest (I can’t tolerate flying a CRJ-200 if I have an option). Chicago Midway was marked with thunderstorms the evening before but Southwest recovered quite well into the morning, as the line of storms move towards east. Detroit’s weather of course was not that great, but at least no thunderstorm and the ATC hold was not too bad. I made it to Delta’s McNamara Terminal around noon.
Photo Link:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/w...8QbNHDNy5bqRW4
Check-in:
It was a very quiet day here in Detroit in both terminals. I assume summer traffic had yet to start and it was still a quiet midday. Delta has divided its check-in counters into domestic, international, Sky Priority for Silver Medallion and low level Skyteam elite members, and then the normal Sky Priority area for all Gold and above Medallions, as well as Skyteam’s Elite Plus members. There was no wait, but I was still expected to use the kiosk to print my boarding pass. The agent technically did not need to do anything except to put a tag on my bag and verified my documents. The automatic process is well designed, but there is a lack of customer interaction and the agent was professional, but came off as cold and indifferent. Of course, I did not notice that my bags were tagged through to Colombo, and neither the agent or myself noticed it till I arrived in Hong Kong. I wasted 30 minutes waiting for bags and only the HKG agent saw that my bag was tagged through to CMB. Customer service was non-existent and does this automated check-in process fundamentally aim to eliminate all customer service? Delta has to balance its automated check in process and maintaining certain customer service aspect especially in the priority lines, and trains its check-in agents accordingly.
There was no personal recognition of me attending the Hong Kong inaugural flight, and of course, same as my diamond medallion status, and I was still wondering what does this supposedly higher elite status meant! The Delta Sky Club attendants gave me the most attention and at least knew that it was the first flight. Gate agent, purser, and flight attendants all did not recognize my Diamond Medallion status.
Boarding:
Sky Club is the same old and I used the one near gate A70, as my flight was departing from A60 today. I went by earlier in the afternoon and noticed that nothing was going on but 12:30pm was just too early. But I got a bad vibe. I spent an hour in the Sky Club catching up emails and related matters, and decided to head down early. The gate was quite crowded but nothing was going on, except there were three Chinese agents working the gate with a red coat. There was obviously nothing going on, unlike the Seoul inaugural flight the day before, as told by the Sky Club agent. I was a little bit disappointed, and neither Detroit or Hong Kong planned anything special and I hope the return inaugural would be better (and hopefully some of you were flying that route). I personally think that Delta has missed a big opportunity to sell this route, which can be a viable competition against United’s ORD-HKG service, which was still operated by a lackluster coach cabin, but Delta Air Lines is just not a familiar name in HK, and they need to work on the brand recognition. They could have easily invited some HK journalists on board, instead of clearing a half load of non-rev. Delta has a nice lie flat business class products and a good AVOD product in both cabins. The only inaugural moment was one of the Chinese gate agents approaching me and wanting me to help the captain to take pictures of the inaugural flight with the Chinese gate agents. The Chinese agents were very excited about it. If the gate agent did not mention the fact that it was an inaugural flight, nobody would know.
The plane, N710DN, arrived around noon and I assumed all were ready, but the boarding time of 2:35pm came and went, and Julia, the head agent, explained that due to a ground power and electrical problem, catering was having problems loading meals early on, and was now catching up. These Chinese ladies do not speak Cantonese at all, and are all mandarin speakers. Julia’s attempt to speak Cantonese was funny for a native speaker to hear, and Delta should have gone with pre-recorded Cantonese announcements. Thankfully the Chinese flight attendant on board speaks fluent Cantonese, although the writers can work on the Chinese scripts. Finally at 3:13pm, boarding commenced and for the gate agents’ credits, door was closed at 3:36pm and with a full load in J and Y (noticeably many non-revenue passengers). Only a few Asians were sitting up front, but the economy cabin was filled with mostly economy passengers with a noticeable amount of Mainland Chinese citizens, who were heading towards Southern China via Hong Kong. Delta Air Lines really needs to work on establishing a deal with the Sky Pier in Hong Kong (so passengers taking ferries from Macau and southern Chinese port cities can simply the ferry ride to the airport, check in at the Sky-Pier terminal, and took a Sky Train towards the terminal without the hassles of obtaining Hong Kong permit and going directly into the airport).
The flight attendants were on the above average side, and immediately swung into actions by passing the usual array of beverages including orange juice, champagne (finally a real one – Piper Heidsieck), water and Heineken, as well as the usual menus. Amenity kits, slippers and headsets, along with pillows and duvets, were already pre-placed at each seat. There seems to be a supervisor or cabin service personal aboard, as he was overlooking all the meal preparation and writing down notes during the whole meal service process. There were some new procedures compared to my last delta International flight. Entrée orders were taken prior to takeoff due to the prolonged waiting times at gate. Orders were taken from front to back with no preference towards elites. We were addressed by our last name – the only time of course.
Unfortunately the early electrical problems also affected the cargo loading, and they were working on our numbers, fuel and routing, and being the first flight, they were a bit slower than usual. We did not push back till 4:25pm and thankfully the weather was clear by now, and we taxied towards R/W22L. By the time we taxied towards the holding line, there were only two aircraft in front of us, a DL’s A330-300 N803NW heading to AMS as DL 242 and a NW painted CRJ-200 N8896A (a Pinnacle aircraft) waiting for takeoff, but there seemed to be a backlog of aircraft waiting to get into DTW, and they cleared at least two to three landing a/c before letting one of us to take off. Finally after a Delta Connection CRJ-900 landed, we took our turn and lifted off at 4:54pm and using most of the runway understandably.
Introduction:
When Delta announced its intent to introduce a nonstop Detroit to Hong Kong flight using Boeing 777-200LR, I immediately tried to find an affordable way to join the inaugural flight, and as one of the longest schedule routes on Delta network, I was hoping for some fanfare. I ended up buying a complex RT ticket from CMB to YVR, and then YVR to YYZ, then DTW-HKG-CMB. This fare has discontinued, but I think I get an okay deal, considered the major detour to DTW. So with excitement, I arrived Detroit’s North Terminal via Southwest (I can’t tolerate flying a CRJ-200 if I have an option). Chicago Midway was marked with thunderstorms the evening before but Southwest recovered quite well into the morning, as the line of storms move towards east. Detroit’s weather of course was not that great, but at least no thunderstorm and the ATC hold was not too bad. I made it to Delta’s McNamara Terminal around noon.
Photo Link:
http://share.shutterfly.com/action/w...8QbNHDNy5bqRW4
Check-in:
It was a very quiet day here in Detroit in both terminals. I assume summer traffic had yet to start and it was still a quiet midday. Delta has divided its check-in counters into domestic, international, Sky Priority for Silver Medallion and low level Skyteam elite members, and then the normal Sky Priority area for all Gold and above Medallions, as well as Skyteam’s Elite Plus members. There was no wait, but I was still expected to use the kiosk to print my boarding pass. The agent technically did not need to do anything except to put a tag on my bag and verified my documents. The automatic process is well designed, but there is a lack of customer interaction and the agent was professional, but came off as cold and indifferent. Of course, I did not notice that my bags were tagged through to Colombo, and neither the agent or myself noticed it till I arrived in Hong Kong. I wasted 30 minutes waiting for bags and only the HKG agent saw that my bag was tagged through to CMB. Customer service was non-existent and does this automated check-in process fundamentally aim to eliminate all customer service? Delta has to balance its automated check in process and maintaining certain customer service aspect especially in the priority lines, and trains its check-in agents accordingly.
There was no personal recognition of me attending the Hong Kong inaugural flight, and of course, same as my diamond medallion status, and I was still wondering what does this supposedly higher elite status meant! The Delta Sky Club attendants gave me the most attention and at least knew that it was the first flight. Gate agent, purser, and flight attendants all did not recognize my Diamond Medallion status.
Boarding:
Sky Club is the same old and I used the one near gate A70, as my flight was departing from A60 today. I went by earlier in the afternoon and noticed that nothing was going on but 12:30pm was just too early. But I got a bad vibe. I spent an hour in the Sky Club catching up emails and related matters, and decided to head down early. The gate was quite crowded but nothing was going on, except there were three Chinese agents working the gate with a red coat. There was obviously nothing going on, unlike the Seoul inaugural flight the day before, as told by the Sky Club agent. I was a little bit disappointed, and neither Detroit or Hong Kong planned anything special and I hope the return inaugural would be better (and hopefully some of you were flying that route). I personally think that Delta has missed a big opportunity to sell this route, which can be a viable competition against United’s ORD-HKG service, which was still operated by a lackluster coach cabin, but Delta Air Lines is just not a familiar name in HK, and they need to work on the brand recognition. They could have easily invited some HK journalists on board, instead of clearing a half load of non-rev. Delta has a nice lie flat business class products and a good AVOD product in both cabins. The only inaugural moment was one of the Chinese gate agents approaching me and wanting me to help the captain to take pictures of the inaugural flight with the Chinese gate agents. The Chinese agents were very excited about it. If the gate agent did not mention the fact that it was an inaugural flight, nobody would know.
The plane, N710DN, arrived around noon and I assumed all were ready, but the boarding time of 2:35pm came and went, and Julia, the head agent, explained that due to a ground power and electrical problem, catering was having problems loading meals early on, and was now catching up. These Chinese ladies do not speak Cantonese at all, and are all mandarin speakers. Julia’s attempt to speak Cantonese was funny for a native speaker to hear, and Delta should have gone with pre-recorded Cantonese announcements. Thankfully the Chinese flight attendant on board speaks fluent Cantonese, although the writers can work on the Chinese scripts. Finally at 3:13pm, boarding commenced and for the gate agents’ credits, door was closed at 3:36pm and with a full load in J and Y (noticeably many non-revenue passengers). Only a few Asians were sitting up front, but the economy cabin was filled with mostly economy passengers with a noticeable amount of Mainland Chinese citizens, who were heading towards Southern China via Hong Kong. Delta Air Lines really needs to work on establishing a deal with the Sky Pier in Hong Kong (so passengers taking ferries from Macau and southern Chinese port cities can simply the ferry ride to the airport, check in at the Sky-Pier terminal, and took a Sky Train towards the terminal without the hassles of obtaining Hong Kong permit and going directly into the airport).
The flight attendants were on the above average side, and immediately swung into actions by passing the usual array of beverages including orange juice, champagne (finally a real one – Piper Heidsieck), water and Heineken, as well as the usual menus. Amenity kits, slippers and headsets, along with pillows and duvets, were already pre-placed at each seat. There seems to be a supervisor or cabin service personal aboard, as he was overlooking all the meal preparation and writing down notes during the whole meal service process. There were some new procedures compared to my last delta International flight. Entrée orders were taken prior to takeoff due to the prolonged waiting times at gate. Orders were taken from front to back with no preference towards elites. We were addressed by our last name – the only time of course.
Unfortunately the early electrical problems also affected the cargo loading, and they were working on our numbers, fuel and routing, and being the first flight, they were a bit slower than usual. We did not push back till 4:25pm and thankfully the weather was clear by now, and we taxied towards R/W22L. By the time we taxied towards the holding line, there were only two aircraft in front of us, a DL’s A330-300 N803NW heading to AMS as DL 242 and a NW painted CRJ-200 N8896A (a Pinnacle aircraft) waiting for takeoff, but there seemed to be a backlog of aircraft waiting to get into DTW, and they cleared at least two to three landing a/c before letting one of us to take off. Finally after a Delta Connection CRJ-900 landed, we took our turn and lifted off at 4:54pm and using most of the runway understandably.
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