Hello, all. I’m pulling this trip report of off the to-do pile since it’s one of the more recent trips I took in September of 2022.

This was the very first flight of an eventual 9 flights that I took in a 3-week period from here in the Gulf region to the Caribbean for a somber family event, then back to the US to spend time with family in Florida and Texas before heading back to the sandbox.

I haven’t flown Etihad in about 4 years because life got in the way of traveling for a while & then there were those 2 years of covid restrictions. All the while though, I was earning Etihad Guest Points from two different reward credit cards. I was able to use almost all the points accrued for a round trip ticket + cash. Normally, I would not fly EY back to the states because their business class tickets are too expensive for my wallet, but this was an essential trip for family reasons, and using all those points considerably softened the blow to my wallet. Another perk about this flight is that there is US Pre-Clearance at AUH for non-stop flights only. You are processed by actual TSA agents in a dedicated facility in the terminal, and arrive in the US as a domestic passenger for immigration purposes. This can be a godsend if you have tight connecting times at JFK, ORD, or IAD. More on this later.

The trip started with a 7AM pickup by Etihad Chauffeur for the short ride to the terminal. The car did have wi-fi, but I did not have the time to try it out because it was that short of a ride.









How short was the ride? Well, I live close enough to the airfield to see this from my balcony.



There is a dedicated Etihad Business check-in at terminal 3, and I’ve used it many times.







Once you are done checking in, you literally have to turn right & walk about 45 second to get to the security screening/passport control area, and that’s if you are a slow walker. That area joins the duty-free area, & then the food courts upstairs on the second level.



























Airside shop.







I followed the signs for US Pre-Clearance, which takes you to the very end of the terminal around gate 34. It’s a walk, but there are travelators. Once there, the entrance to the Pre-Clearance area is controlled by a ground agent. The way it works is that you are allowed into the facility by your flight departure time. I got there at 7:30 and I was let in seeing how my flight to JFK left at 10AM, & went in after showing the gate agent my boarding pass. Some passengers for the 11AM flight to IAD were told they were too early, & had to wait till 9AM, I think. At the end of the hall, there is another control point where the passengers are separated into separate lines for business/coach for another security screening. Now I saw why the crowd control measures were in effect. The area was full of people for the JFK flight, and there were about 6 TSA agents to process everyone. However, biz class passengers have their own dedicated lane, and the process was a breeze.

Ok, here is a successes story about when government agencies get it right with the right employees. I have TSA-Precheck/Known Traveler Number, but my Global Entry card had expired. All I needed to complete my Global Entry renewal was to do the interview with a TSA agent, which can take months to get an appointment when you are stateside, so forget about doing it if you are located OCONUS like I am for most of the year. The agent saw that I had pre-check, and asked if I had Global Entry. I told him I my about my renewal situation, so the agent pulled up my information right there and then, asked me a few questions, & took my photo. Literally completed the interview standing right there at the checkpoint. Got my card three weeks later. When the gov’t works, it works. Funny, the same situation at JFK 3 weeks later was the exact opposite.

With that process complete, I exited the facility after a total of 30 minutes from entry to exit. Etihad has a dedicated lounge for pre-clearance business passengers. Its right down the hall from the facility, but before you are back into the gate area. Its not huge like the other lounges, but if there are only 3 pre-clearance flights a day (JFK, ORD, IAD), it doesn’t have to be big.

The lounge has standard fare for food, beverages & booze. Power outlets were available all over, even down by your feet by the couches. It helps to have a plug adapter. Wi fi was available for free.























After spending about an hour & a half in the lounge, I headed out to the gate for a 9:30 boarding.



Lets talk about this plane. Etihad bought these A350-1000s new, but put them into storage during the whole covid crisis thing. Now they are out of storage and making money. They are all in a 2-class configuration, business & coach, no first class.

Looking forward to part 2

Yeah, I'm working on it. My dumb butt hit the wrong button while I was watching football, and I couldn't find the edit button, if there is one.

Sorry, hit the wrong button. Where was I... Oh yeah, time to board.







No greater feeling than the first boarding of a long trip. Boarding started at about 9:25 and I was in my seat by 9:30. The biz-class folks boarded through door 1L, while coach went through 2L.















No issues with footroom.







Overhead lights, but no individual air vents.



Shoulder reading light. Press in the back, it pops out and turns on. Push it back in flush, light turns off.



The seat actually had a door that enclosed you up to about eye level, depending on how tall you are. Once you reclined your seat, it felt much more private.



A wellness kit was at the seat.









Aqua Di Parma amenities kit from the Italian design house with eye mask, socks, toothbrush & toothpaste, Aqua Di Parma branded hand cream & a small sample of Aqua Di Parma Colonia. Its marketed as an unisex fragrance, & being an avid men's fragrance collector, I added it to my to-buy list for the summer months. Its a very lemon citrus-forward, soapy, right out of the shower scent which works well for hot weather, ie, like in a desert country that sees 100+ deg days 6 months out of the year.





Noise cancelling headphones.





Power ports consisted of an electrical outlet in one of the storage compartments, a USB port, and a wireless charging pad by the IFE screen.





The wireless charging pad didn't work with my brand new phone for some reason, but I didn't investigate further.





Pre-departure beverages were orange juice, champagne, mint with lemon, or water. The FAs came around and took out breakfast orders right around 10:00
Pushback was around 1015, right on time. I hadn't noticed how much time passed. The seat was comfortable, pre-departure beverages were on demand until then, and I was exploring the seats features and taking photos for this review, so it didn’t feel like close to an hour had passed. I was also reviewing the rest of my flights for the 32-hour travel day ahead of me.

A coworker recommended using App In The Air to consolidate all of my travel plans into one app since I was using 3 different airlines & had 9 different flights to catch in total. It worked for me, especially with the delays I was about to experience at JFK in about 17 hours.



Was surprised to see a QANTAS A380 there. Despite this being a desert, its a very humid desert located alongside a large body of salt water. Corrosion is a daily issue.



Lining up on 31L, and off the ground at 10:27.



Al Raha Beach. I can see my building in the lower left corner.



Lets look at the lavatory. Small, tight & functional best I can describe it. The cabin crew kept it tidy as far as I could tell, and it was in use a lot. The red "in-use" lights were on quite a bit There were two for that section of the cabin, one per side, so each lav serviced 22 passengers for 15 hrs.













Food time.



Arabic mezze starter of chilled haloumi cheese & tomatoes, with balsamic vinegar/olive oil was served about an hour after departure.



Lunch was brought out 20 minutes after the appetizer. I had the fillet of beef with a rum & coke.



Dessert was cheesecake.



Time to explore the IFE offerings for the flight. One thing I'd like to mention is how by this time, with all the food cleared, everyone, I mean everyone, pulled down their window shades. I've been a Boeing guy for 30 years, but the electro-dimmable windows on the 787 cannot do a comparable job on a long haul day flight verses a simple physical window shade. It was dark as a tomb for hours on end, and it was great.



























The maps & data screens.

















WiFi. I used some of my Etihad Guest Miles for about 3 hours worth of texting with folks back in the UAE, in the US, & in the Caribbean.

















At about the 7 hr mark, I asked for a chicken sandwich.



About an hour before landing, small snack baskets were handed out.



All too soon, it was time to come back to earth and end 14 hours of near bliss. This is a return to JFK for me after 31 years of being away because of my military service & my post-military career, so yeah, it was bittersweet. I remember flying in and out of there on AA 707s, Pan Am 737-200s, & A300s, & BWIA L1011s as a kid and teenager from the 70s till about 1991.





The landing on 22L was smooth as the rest of the flight. Etihad is out of T4, the Int. Arrivals Building, and we pulled up to gate A2 at the base of the control tower at about 4PM local time. Just get up & go grab your bags, easy-peasy. However as fortunes change, I was about to have a change of luck with my flight to Orlando.

Delta is co-located in T4, so all I had to do was drag my bags upstairs to the upper level to the main check-in hall.



This was my first time in this terminal, as it wasn't here 30 years ago. Sky Priority check-in is tucked away off in a corner, not the easiest to find even with the signs. When I booked this particular ticket some month ago, I could not input my TSA pre-check information no matter what I tried. Fast forward to me standing at the counter, and the agent still could not input my information. Well, dang. The security screening line was as long & winding as you would expect it to be for the PM departure rush hour at a major international airport. I had plenty of time before my next flight, and I was traveling solo at this point, so I drank the cool-aid and got in line. Once that was done, I had to get to T2 from T4 for my flight to Orlando. That involves catching an air-side shuttle bus from T4 to T2, which was two levels down on actual ground level. No big affair, and since it was on the tarmac, you can get some good views of the action, and I would of gotten some pics if my phone wasn't buried at the bottom of my bag.

Approximation of shuttle bus route in orange.



Terminal 2... What can I say about it... Time stopped in 1979 for that terminal... Its like the Port Authority bus terminal on 42nd street was disguising itself as an airport terminal. Anyone ever flown through Changi? This is the opposite of that.



The fact that I couldn't get into the Delta lounge only poured lemon juice on my paper cut. Oh well, I was only about 12 hours away from relaxing on Caribbean beach. Then the weather delays started. The departure time kept getting pushed back, as evidence by the real-time emails I was getting from Delta. It ended up being a long night.



Original schedule.


What it ended up being.



Boarding finally started at about 9:15PM, over 2 hours late, but at least I wasn't sitting in the terminal anymore.









There still was weather along the route, so it was bumpy enough to delay meal service about 45 minutes.

Beef brisket.



When the flight landed at close to 1AM, the ramp was absolutely still. We were the only aircraft moving, along with the ramp personnel for that gate.





The terminal was similarly deserted.











The delay took away any reasonable expectation of having my family pick me up at the airport, so I rented a car for the shortest time period I ever have, and headed out to their house to do laundry and take a shower & power nap before having to be back at the airport in 3 hours to check in for my remaining two flights to get to the Caribbean.

Terminal 2 at JFK is now closed forever and demolition will begin for a giant new Terminal 1 in its place.

Thanks for the info.