Regarding the title of my report: Germanwings used to have ads at STN airport "Invade Germany!" advertising their cheap fares to Germany. Well sometimes the fares from Germany to the UK are cheap as well, I was looking for a cheap Germanwings flight to STN for ages, and finally I found a 19€ fare on their website, so I booked my annual STN visit on Germanwings. I used to fly Ryanair from FKB, but flying from STR is much more convenient for me, and of course another advantage of flying Germanwings: they're not Ryanair  

STR-STN
29 July 2005
4U 2332
Operated by Nordic Leisure
STD: 06:50 ATD: 06:54/06:59
STA: 07:25 ATA: 07:16/07:21
Seat 9F
MD-87
SE-RBA
First flight 30 July 1987

View Large View Medium Photo © Janne Laukkonen - FAP

View Large View Medium Photo © Ingemar Eliasson

This aircraft is ex-Finnair, Spanair, FlyMe:

View Large View Medium Photo © Alastair T. Gardiner - WorldAirImages

View Large View Medium Photo © Otto Benischek

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Photo © Mats Norsten


My train arrived at the airport a few at 05:30, and I went directly upstairs through Terminal 1 and then straight to Germanwings' Terminal 2. This terminal is now used only by Germanwings, about six or seven counters were opened, most of them were "Germanwings - all flights", but two counters were "Germanwings - London-Stansted". Baggage for check-in gets screened already before check-in, and I guess they're more strict about baggage to the UK, that's why they have dedicated counters for Stansted. As I didn't have any baggage for check-in, I also didn't have anything for the X-Ray machines, so after just a few minutes of queuing it was my turn for check-in. As my ID card will expire in August, the agent asked me how long I'd stay in the UK. Aah, only a daytrip, so that's okay. Got my paper boarding pass with security number 43, gate 345 in Terminal 3, but for any reason I went to Terminal 4, passed security there and went from there to my gate in Terminal 3.

The gate was opened at boarding time 06:15, and as always on flights with free seating, everybody already queued at the gate. Pre-boarding of a weelchair passenger, then an announcement was made, "Welcome to your Germanwings flight, this flight is operated by Germanwings' subsidiary ('Tochtergesellschaft') Nordic Leisure", so Nordic Leisure is a subsidiary of Germanwings? I didn't know that... At 06:20 the first bus arrived, for families with children and boarding numbers 1-60. Another ID check at the gate - not only for STN flights, Germanwings at STR check IDs at the gate for all their flights. Soon our bus left, and I guess I was really lucky to get the MD-87, as there were the usual 5 Germanwings A319s at the airport, plus the occasionally used Nordic Leisure aircraft. So our bus stopped in front of SE-RBA, nobody dared to use the MD's rear airstairs, everybody queued in the front, and they looked at me like I was mad when I left the queue and went to the rear, and nobody dared to follow me.



I said good morning to the two Nordic Leisure flight attendants at the rear, went forward to get seat 9F, and seized the occasion to get a cabin shot because the rear cabin was of course still empty:



As you can see, the aircraft has blue fabric seats with the purple Germanwings headrest covers. The seats were comfortable, and as you know I'm not the type of guy who complains about legspace, however later during the flight when the passenger in front of me reclined his seat, I had his seat literally in my face, so the only thing I could do was to recline my seat as well, an MD-87 with 130 seats is simply a bit cramped.



The crew on this flight consisted of three Nordic Leisure f/as who spoke only English (and I guess Swedish as well), one of them being the tallest f/a I've ever seen, she was something like 2 meters tall. In addition to that, there was a Germanwings f/a on board, but they referred to her as a Germanwings "representative", in fact she was mostly there to do the German announcements. One more thing about the cabin, the "Exit / Salida" signs showed this aircraft's history with Spanair. Inside of the seat pockets there was a free magazine "Focus Money" and of course a meal menu, but prices for snacks and drinks were quite expensive, so I was happy that I had bought some sandwiches before departure at the bakery in Terminal 3.

Doors were closed, and at 06:54 we started our short way towards runway 07. Sitting on the right-hand side, I had a view over the cargo area, with an An124, an AN26, an AN12 plus the usual DHL B757 and a Westair ATP.





We took off in eastern direction, Bernhausen in the background:


ThyssenKrupp Aufzüge:


Neuhausen:


Autobahnanschlussstelle Esslingen:


Autobahn A8 Stuttgart-Munich:


We turned right and made a 180° turn:


So we soon had a good view over the airport:




Sindelfingen, with the DaimlerChrysler factory:


Böblingen:


Cabin crew started their service, but they were not so motivated to sell anything, in fact they just passed with the trolley quite quickly and were happy that hardly anybody stopped them, then again the aircraft was only about half full anyway. In the end they sold a few coffees I think. I didn't care, on lowcost flights looking out of the window is in my opinion the best thing one can do. So we just passed the airport of Karlsruhe/Baden-Baden:





The co-pilot made his announcement in English language, telling us about our routing and that we would soon be able to see the city of Paris. But we couldn't, because it became cloudy somewhere over France, and it stayed like this until our arrival at STN:


He also announced about temperatures in STN, "...hope you brought some warm clothes with you", it was the hottest summer where we left, but at STN is was only about 10°C and raining. We soon started our descend.

Stansted with two Ryanair B737-800s:


A Malev B737-600:


We taxied to our parking position, passed an all-white B737-300 in front of the SR Technics hangar, but you could eaily tell that this is an ex-Easyjet aircraft because the titles were so cheaply overpainted. We soon arrived at our parking position, de-boarding via both airstairs again, but sitting in row 9 I had to take the airstair in the front:





I continued my trip to Newcastle, on Easyjet, but this will be another report that will be posted later this week. So here's the Germanwings return flight:

STN-STR
29 July 2005
4U 2337
STD: 20:10 ATD: 21:33/21:45
STA: 22:35 ATA: 23:53/23:58
Seat 22F
A319-114
First flight 29 November 1996

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Photo © Markus Moßhammer


"TAFKAT - The Aircraft Formerly Known As Trier"  

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Photo © Marc-André Veillard


D-AILF was also once leased out to Air Malta:

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Photo © Jan Lidestrand


After my arrival back from NCL, I went directly to the Germanwings counters, two check-in desks for both flights (one to STR and one to CGN). No queues at all, I gave my ID card to the indian Swissport agent, but she couldn't find my name. That was because my last name contains an ü, which becomes ue when it's used internationally, so I booked it with an ue, but of course on my ID it's an ü. So I told her it's ue, she was a bit confused but then gave me my boarding pass, security number 057, gate 33. I asked her about how many passengers there were booked, 128. I went through security and then took the train to my gate.

At 19:30, they made an announcement at the gate, the flight would be delayed by about 45 minutes because of thunderstorms in Germany. Also here in Stansted there were heavy thunderstorms, and it was raining like something I haven't seen before. Quite entertaining to sit inside, watch the thunderstorm and the rain, and all the Ryanair passengers becoming wet as they queue in front of their planes - this part of STN is mostly used by Ryanair. By the way all Ryanair flights were also delayed. At 20:00, another announcement was made, 1:20h delay for our flight to STR. "We apologize for the obvious inconvenience caused by this delay". Yes the inconvenience was quite obvious, because we would arrive at STR by midnight, but apparently it was a huge thunderstorm over STR that evening. Still I heard some passengers say "Typical Germanwings!", but then again the Ryanair passengers said "Typical Ryanair!", so I guess it's always the airline's fault.

At 20:53, we saw D-AILF landing through the huge windows in the waiting area, and once at the gate I couldn't believe my eyes, they used a jetway, probably because it was still raining like I-don't-know-what. Only ten minutes after on-block, boarding started. As everybody was standing all around the gate, they made an announcement that passengers should queue in a single line, but then they had to realize that they were not succesful, most passengers were German, we're not British, waiting in line "is not our thing", so it was an unorganized but quick boarding, the escalator(!) downstairs and then the jetway to the aircraft. Good luck that this was Germanwings, on Ryanair we would have become wet walking through the rain.

We were welcomed by the friendly cabin crew, they told us to walk to the rear to make boarding quicker, still everybody wanted a seat in the front, I went to the rear, took my seat 22F, and although the flight was more or less full, there were some seats remaining vacant in the rear, one of them being 22E the seat next to mine. The ex-LH A319s have still the LH cabin, grey leather seats with some yellow.

We pushed back at 21:33 and took off at 21:45 into a dramatic sky with a thunderstorm. We climbed only a few thousand feet and then passed low-level under or through the thunderstorm, it was quite interesting. Just later when we had passed the London area, we could climb higher.

Cabin service began, but again they didn't sell much on this late evening. Later on, they even passed with some Mövenpick icecream, which reminded me of my recent Swiss flights. But they didn't sell a single icecream.

Routing this time via the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg. Then we started our descend again, approaching from the east over Esslingen, then landing on runway 25 at 23:53, on-block at 23:58. We were bussed to the terminal building quickly, also passport control was quick, but of course it was still too late for passengers who wanted to take a train to the city of Stuttgart, the last train leaves at the airport at 00:08. I saw lots of passengers who were quite angry that they now obviously had to take a taxi. I was lucky because I still had a public transport available even after midnight, so I arrived home at 00:45. It was a long but nice day. Regarding Germanwings, they were better than Ryanair, mostly because they fly from/to STR which is much more convenient for me. Of course they also fly to STN, so if you want to visit the city of London, you might be better off taking BA or even LH to LHR, both airlines have sometimes quite attractive fares. Regarding on-board service, well, it's lowcost, in a way they're all the same. Germanwings was certainly nothing special, but they brought me from A to B and back. Feel free to add your comments to my report, any feedback is welcome. Thanks in advance, Alex.