Last year, investment group Leadgate purchased 75% of Pluna, the small, profitless Uruguayan flag carrier, with plans to completely transformate it, producing profits as early as this year (the fuel price has somewhat delayed their plans)

Key in their plans is the creation of a regional hub at Montevideo, from where it is possible to access several destinations in Argentina without the trouble of changing airports (AEP to EZE) in Buenos Aires.

A very important part in their transformation was the purchase of 7 CRJ900 NextGens (plus 8 options) with which to replace the old 737 fleet, mostly composed by the –200 variant.

At the moment five CRJs have been delivered. The sole 767, CX-PUG, will be retained for the intercontinental flight to Madrid.

A radically new corporate scheme, designed by Australian Ken Cato, was implemented as well.

New regional destinations, like Cordoba, Rosario, Bariloche (Argentina), Curitiba and Rio de Janeiro (Brazil), have been added, helping with the creation of a real regional hub at MVD.

The airline website, flypluna.com has taken a new protagonism, offering online check in and very attractive offers to different Pluna destinations.


When time to travel overseas arrived, I decided to book my international flight out of EZE instead of MVD, just to try the “new” Pluna and their brand new CRJs. That was the reason I booked MVD-AEP-MVD with them, all through flypluna.com, a very easy and straightforward process. Soon I received an email confirming my purchase, and with my flight details.

FLIGHT 1, MVD-AEP
PU153
08:20 hrs.
CRJ 900 CX-CRB

I left my home very early, as I don’t directly live in Montevideo. The weather was foggy, thing that slowed my trip down to MVD a little, and will continue to give problems the whole morning. I elected not to make my check in online, as the system is quite new, and I still don’t trust it completely.

When I arrived at the airport, I found out that it was effectively closed because of meteorology, read, fog. However, the lady at check in told me not to worry, she doubted the fog would last until 8:20 hrs.

The check in line was very fast, in fact, there were very few passengers on it. After check in, I paid the Airport Tax (16 USS for Shuttle flights to AEP) and went airside.

At those early hours, Immigration was fast, and Security relaxed. Once inside I encountered the quite upset crowds of the very early morning TA flight to LIM, GOL to POA, and Pluna´s first flight to AEP (I was in the second), all stranded because of the fog and waiting for good news.

MVD´s gates area is quite small, and with those 4 flights (including mine) the place was quite full. A totally new, and very necessary, terminal is being constructed, aperture planned for this summer (for people in the southern hemisphere) / winter (people in the north hemisphere.

Suddenly, a flurry of activity took place at both the TACA and Gol counters, while both airlines called their respective flights for boarding. Obviously, the airport was now opened, the fog had cleared enough to ensure safe operations.

No word from the Pluna desk, though. I realized that AEP was surely also plagued with fog, which was delaying our flights even further, but most passengers were quite upset at watching everyone leaving except ourselves.



Fifteen minutes later, Pluna started calling for their first flight to Buenos Aires. We were finally leaving. A few minutes later, our flight was also called.

Pluna calls first all passengers on rows 23-15, something that contributes to a faster boarding procedure. As I was seating on row 4, I was one of the last passengers to board. Boarding was done with the traditional bussing system (MVD´s current terminal has only one finger, the new one will have 4), which always provides good views of the aircraft, but also makes the row boarding system useless.

With the bus, we approached two Pluna CRJs, CX-CRD (painted purple) will be flying the first flight (I’ll see the aircraft again in AEP), and CX-CRB, the second CRJ received (painted green) would be performing our flight.







As you can see, bussing offers plenty of picture opportunities. This was going to be my first CRJ900 flight, in fact, my first RJ flight at all, so I was quite excited.

My first impression when I boarded was how small it looked compared to the traditional 737. And how super modern everything looked, specially when compared to the old 737-200 (the NextGen interior is amazing) The smart gray leather seats combined with the LED lighting made the interior look space age.



Sorry for the blurry picture. Once on my seat, I realized it was quite comfortable and it had good legroom.



The windows were huge, pity they are so separated. However, all rows except 14 (right before the emergency exit) have a window. If you someday fly with a Pluna CRJ, remember to avoid row 14.



I also found very interesting the LED illumination used.





After all passengers were seated, the safety briefing was performed. Due to the short duration of the flight (just 30 minutes), the presentation was quite short, skipping notably the oxygen mask and life vest parts. It was done manually; surprisingly Pluna´s CRJs aren’t equipped with any IFE in which an automized safety briefing could be presented.

The captain on this flight was Canadian, providing training on the CRJ for the Uruguayan pilots. Thus, all PA announcements to the crew were in English. The whole crew, and Canadian captain, seemed to be in a good mood, for example when the lead FA communicated to the captain “Cabin secured”, the captain responded something and the FA laughing repeated, in Spanish, “Cabina asegurada”

Soon we took off, 30 minutes late. The videos of this flight are very nice; but I specially recommend watching the videos of the second one later on the report. Those are, in my opinion, truly superb. The truly fun part of this particular video starts at minute number one.



Following take off, the lead FA, in a PA, publicized Pluna´s new destinations, and flypluna.com. The Spanish part is captured in the video.

We soon over flew Montevideo.



Winglet...



Pluna currently does not serve onboard anything on any regional flights. A system of buy on board will shortly be implemented. Today, however, nothing.

Soon, the Argentina coast came insight.





And we over flew the city of La Plata.



The approach to Buenos Aires was very strange, we went inland, instead of always staying over the river, as I always have done. Different.

This routing gave very good views of my final destination in Buenos Aires, Ezeiza Airport.



And of sprawling Buenos Aires...



I also took a video of the landing into AEP.


AEP is quite close to central Buenos Aires, as you can see in this picture.



As we approached our final parking spot, several aircraft, including CX-CRD, came into view.



We parked right next to CX-CRD, and deboarding was done with bussing, which again provided with excellent photography opportunities of both CX-CRB and CX-CRD.

On deboarding, a caught a picture of an empty seat,



CX-CRB



Next to us, CX-CRD was boarding for a flight back to MVD






FLIGHT 2, AEP-MVD
PU162
16:50 hrs.
CRJ 900 CX-CRE

I arrived in AEP very early (and tired) from EZE, using the Manuel Tienda Leon bus, after a long night in an airplane. The fact is that at around 12:00 I was already at the airport, wanting to get home ASAP and with 4 hours 50 minutes to spend there.

My first reaction was to head to Pluna´s counter to check in and get rid of my bag. Once I got there, I was disappointed by the look of the place. Quite shabby, in my opinion.

For a start, Pluna has elements from the last three visual identities displayed. The original, Varig inspired logo is displayed over the desks, while the next color scheme (the slightly modified- and appalling- one with the curved “Pluna” titles) was displayed everywhere else. The current Ken Cato one was only found in the carry on size stand.

It also seemed that the whole system there is manual. When I tried to check in, the lady kindly said she couldn’t, as she was currently working in the full PDP bound flight, and pointed at a stack of bags behind her (no belt there) She said I could leave the bag there stored for a few hours, but warned me that she and all her coulleges were eventually leaving to work in the PDP flight, leaving the desk (and my bag) alone without security. I declined her offer.

So I was stuck with my bag for the next few hours. I went and had lunch, and then proceeded to the “Little Corner”, a well known spotting point in AEP. From there, I witnessed CX-CRE´s arrival. The aircraft would go on to operate the 14:00 flight to PDP, return to AEP, and then operate PU162 (my flight) to MVD.

CX-CRE is the fifth and currently newest CRJ with Pluna. In fact it had only a few days of service at the time of my trip, a week ago. A truly factory fresh plane.

CX-CRE combines the red colors of CX-CRC with the hummingbird of CX-CRB. A truly pretty plane as well.



Also in AEP was sistership CX-CRC (original red CRJ), which spent all day there. Apparently, when the fire suppression system was being tested, the system discharged, making the aircraft non airworthy. Anyways, it just sat there looking quite sad.

I returned to the check in desks by 15:30, and easily checked in for the flight, obtaining the seat I wanted, towards the back, over the wing and near to the engines, in row 19.

Paying Airport Tax, passing Immigration (both Argentinean and Uruguayan is made at AEP) and Security was all a breeze.

After a long wait, I finally saw CX-CRE arriving again, from PDP. Now it was my turn to fly. Unfortunately, the aircraft arrived late from PDP, making the flight 30 minutes late.

Boarding procedure was again performed by rows, very good idea but again proving totally useless when we were all put in a bus. Nonetheless, I soon boarded what turned out to be a completely full flight.

The cabin, as CX-CRB´s, was very fresh and good looking. Not surprising on such a new aircraft.



My seat was also right over the wing, providing an excellent view of it. Beyond the winglet, a LAN Argentina A320 sat nearby, ready for her next flight.





Today, we did not have a Canadian pilot, 100% Uruguayan crew, that, as like in PU153, were in a very good mood. The captain apologized profusely for the delay, saying it was caused by Uruguayan ATC, who were protesting by limiting the amount of flights per hour into Montevideo, something out of control by the airline.

Safety demo was performed, and we soon pushed back and passed right behind CX-CRC.



We taxied past the airport´s parking lot, with flaps already extended.



And then we took off.



Right after takeoff, we banked away from Buenos Aires into the River Plate.



The flight itself was wonderful. As in the outbound flight, no service whatsoever, but the clouds at dawn made for some amazing sights. Truly the magic of flight.





Short time after, we started our descent. Speed brakes were deployed.



Further down the descent, we crossed the cloud line. What a difference between over the clouds and below them!





And then we landed. This video is very interesting, as you can see the beautiful approach to Montevideo, an AR 737 about to return to AEP, several CRJs on the ground, and, towards the end, MVD´s new terminal in construction.



As a side note, only half of the passengers had MVD as their final destination, most were connecting with Pluna to Brazil. Seems the hub is working.




And thus the trip ended. In summary, a vastly improved experience over the one provided by the old Pluna (except in catering – now there’s none) I hope you enjoyed reading the report and understood my English.

In this same trip, I also got to fly on a Tame Boeing 727, about what I’ll be writing a TR as well.

[Edited 2008-07-18 14:26:36]