So instead of flying East around the Earth, I will face headwinds the entire way beginning with my trip to Tokyo that starts tomorrow. It is going to be a bit of a hassle to get to Tokyo due to heavy domestic flight loads tomorrow. It looks like I am going to have to fly from Charleston, SC to Atlanta, then on to San Diego, then hop on a quick commuter flight up to Los Angeles before enjoying the In ‘n Out Burger for a few hours. Then tomorrow night, if all goes well, I will be tucked into my Business Class seat to Tokyo-Haneda.

I plan on spending a few days in Tokyo before flying out of Narita on Emirates Airlines’ Airbus a380. After a few days in Dubai I will try Emirates’ 777-300ER service on a haul to Manchester, United Kingdom where I will spend a few days before NonReving back to the States from London Heathrow. Unfortunately it doesn’t look like I will get the chance to visit Singapore or Hong Kong this time around but I have plenty of time to use my flight benefits. I am very excited for my first a380 flight even though it will be a long 12 hours in Economy Class.

Stay tuned as I am going to try to provide updates of my trip at least once a day.

At a short hop of 18 Hours and 55 minutes Singapore Airlines Flight 22 travels from the Singapore-Changi Airport to Newark International near New York City. The flight covers a distance of about 8500 nautical miles as the crow flies. Once arriving in Newark, the plane turns around and returns to Singapore as flight 21 and is airborne for another 18 hours and 40 minutes. The return flight is just a bit shorter due to tailwinds and its’ route. This makes these flights the longest and second longest in the world. These flights utilize the Airbus A340-500 aircraft in a 100 seat-all Business Class configuration.

After its’ duration, the craziest part of this flight is its’ route. Mostly all flights from the Continental United States to Asia travel over Northern North America and cross the Pacific Ocean going both directions. This flight actually flies Eastbound on both the outbound and return segments. The flight from Newark to Singapore actually crosses the North Atlantic with the rest of the New York – Europe flights to take advantage of the trade winds and then continues on without stopping for fuel. (Singapore’s flights from New York-JFK to Changi stop in Frankfurt, Germany) This means you can actually circumnavigate the globe on just 2 flight segments. Once in a while the flight will fly directly over the North Pole instead of overflying Europe.

The flight from Singapore-Changi to Newark flies Eastbound over Japan, the North Pacific, Alaska, and Canada as do most US-Asia flights. (Photo from Flightaware.com)

This shows the flight’s path on the return segment back to Singapore. It flies over the North Atlantic, Northern and Eastern Europe, and India. It’s crazy to think you can fly from New York to Asia without crossing the Pacific. (Photo from FlightAware.com)

I don’t know about you but 37 hours in Singapore Airlines’ Business Class sounds awesome to me. I really feel like I may have to try this out on a separate trip from mine coming up in a couple weeks. Unfortunately, 20,000 miles in a premium cabin on one of the nicest airlines out there doesn’t come cheap. A few trial dates this summer priced out at about $7,000 dollars roundtrip. It’s definitely an awesome way to burn some Star Alliance frequent flyer miles if you happen to have extras. Unfortunately the carrier announced that it will be discontinuing this route sometime this year. It doesn’t look like a specific date has been set yet but the flight is bookable throughout this Summer. Fly it while you can!!

Comment below with some of the longest flights you’ve ever been on!

The Thirty Thousand Blog is written by Kyle Dunst. Like us on Facebook or follow @30ThousandBlog on Twitter. You can also subscribe via email or RSS using the links on the right.

I don’t think there is any better company to intern or Co-op for than a major airline. Seriously, what other kind of company allows college students to travel literally anywhere in the world they want to go for free? While some students use their Non Revenue, or “nonrev”, flight benefits to fly around the country to see friends and family, I have taken full advantage of them and travelled about as far away as possible. Up until I started Co-oping, I had never left North America. In the last few months alone, I have crossed the North Atlantic 8 times. I have done everything from touring pretty much all of Germany to flying to South Carolina for lunch with my mom.

First in January, I flew to Stuttgart, Germany for a weekend which served as my first experience in Europe. There I visited the Porsche Museum and Factory and explored a less traveled, but still awesome, German city. Next up was a weekend away in Madrid with a couple of friends that I work with. We fit pretty much everything there is to see in the Capitol of Spain into about a 20 hour time frame. A few weeks later I decided last minute to go see London for a weekend. By last minute I mean that I showed up to the airport having no idea where I was going. I was at the gate for the flight to Brussels, Belgium and changed my mind last minute and headed to London. Having the freedom to do that is awesome. There I saw just a small fraction of the tourist sights and spent some time checking out the massive London-Heathrow Airport. I also went to see the downtown London-City Airport in action which is one of the most unique out there. Luckily I’ll be spending more time in London this summer before I head to the Paris Air Show. Last month I had the opportunity to take a longer trip to Europe, a whopping 5 days. My Dad and I flew into Munich and spent a few days there before heading down the Autobahn to the Medieval town of Rothenburg ob der Tauber and flying out of Frankfurt am Main. My Mom and I also flew to Washington-Reagan for the day last month to see our nation’s capitol for this first time. This past weekend I flew to Charleston, South Carolina for lunch. This weekend I am going to take one more short trip and head to St. Louis, Missouri for a few hours just to see the Gateway Arch.

My route map from this Semester. I crossed the Atlantic Ocean 8 times and travelled a total of 38,250 miles.

Stuttgart, Germany (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Stuttgart from the 767-300ER (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Bull Fight Stadium in Madrid (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Royal Guard near Buckingham Palace in London. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

National Archives in Washington, D.C. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

My Dad really enjoying his pretzel at the Hofbrauhaus Munchen in Munich, Germany (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

The Medieval Town of Rothenburg ob der Tauber in Central Germany. It looked like it came right from the movie “Shrek” (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Part of the Lufthansa Headquarters at the Frankfurt Airport. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

What trip to Europe would be complete without some intense airplane spotting, even if it about 10 degrees?

This Summer I have about a month off between the time I finish Co-oping for the term and when I return to Auburn University for classes. It took me about 10 minutes to decide what I would do with all that time off. I will be flying around the world. 2 weeks from today on May 12th I will begin my first “Round The World” trip which will take me to 5 Countries over the course of about 17 days. I will be NonReving from Atlanta to Dubai where I will spend a few days. I will then take Cathay Pacific to Hong Kong where I will also take a day trip to the Special Administration Area of Macau. I will then continue on to Singapore, also on Cathay Pacific. I will spend a couple days there before NonReving to Tokyo-Narita. A few days later I will NonRev from Tokyo’s downtown Haneda Airport to LAX before finding my way somehow. In total, I will spend about 50 hours in the air and travel about 40,000 miles. I will definitely have a lot to write about upon returning and I hope to even do some Blogging while on the trip.

A few weeks after returning from my Round the World trip I will be travelling to London with a friend before we head over to Paris for the 2013 Le Bourget Air Show. That will add about another 9,000 miles to my total for the year. Right now my goal is to travel 200,000 miles this year and 1,000,000 miles by the end of my Co-op. I’d say I’m off to a pretty good start.

Follow along with me as I go on all my journeys by liking Thirty Thousand on Facebook or following @30ThousandBlog on Twitter. You can also subscribe by email or RSS using the links on the right.

As many of you know, the location of Europe’s main air show rotates each year between Farnborough in the United Kingdom and Le Bourget in Paris, France. Well, this years headlining air show is just a couple of months away. The 2013 Paris Air Show will take place from June 17th to the 23rd at the Le Bourget Airport, just a few miles away from Paris’ Charles De Gaulle International. I am excited to have the opportunity to travel to the show this year so that I can cover it first hand.

In addition to the awesome lineup of Commercial and military aircraft that will be on display and performing at the show, we can expect a large number of orders from airlines all over the world as it looks like the industry has officially turned around and begun to steadily grow again. Last years orders at Farnborough were dominated by smaller, narrow-body mainline aircraft. In fact, all of Boeing’s 370 orders were for some variant of the 737, whether it be the MAX 8, MAX 9, -800, or -900ER. Airbus sold 86 aircraft from the a320 family as well as 10 a350′s and 5 a330′s. Well we can surely expect to see several similar orders this year, I really hope we see airlines start to pick up more widebody aircraft to replace their aging fleets. In particular, Boeing 747-8 orders have been very quiet, with Lufthansa being the only Passenger airline to currently operate the type. Hopefully we will see some orders for those as well as the a380 and a350. It will be very interesting to see what happens with Boeing 787 orders this time around with all the recent problems surrounding the program.

There are a few things that aviation fans had hoped would occur during this years show but unfortunately probably aren’t going to happen. The main thing, for me at least, was the official debut of the Airbus a350. Many had hoped the new airliner would be able to fly for spectators but it looks like it will still be on the ground at the factory in Toulouse. The first test flights are expected later in the summer with an airshow debut most likely occuring at Farnborough next year or Dubai in the fall. The Bombardier CSeries probably won’t be ready for the show either. Air show organizers have said that 2 Boeing 787′s will be on display and perform demonstration flights this year. One will be from Qatar Airways and the other from Boeing itself. I would also expect an a380 but this has not yet been officially announced. Russia will debut its’ new Su-35 fighter jet as well as the Yak 130.

No matter what happens with orders and demonstration flights, this air show is looking like it will have one of the biggest turnouts in recent years. All 2,000 exhibitor spaces had sold out by the end of January and organizers expect record crowds from both trade visitors and the general public. Airlines currently registered to attend include Aerolineas Argentinas, Air France-KLM, Qatar Airways, and many others.

Make sure to follow along as I report live from Le Bourget this June. You can stay updated via Facebook, Twitter, or by subscribing to receive emails.

Air India has stated that they also plan on resuming 787 service within the next week or so. Their aircraft have already received the work necessary to fix the battery problem and the airline is now just waiting for approval from the Indian equivalent of the FAA to carry passengers aboard. No word yet as to exactly which route the aircraft will fly on but it was previously used on medium haul domestic flights within India from the airline’s Delhi hub.

Other airlines hope to have their Dreamliner’s back in the air as soon as possible. United Airlines has begun ferrying its grounded aircraft to Kelly Field in Texas so that it can begin the repair process. United will resume domestic 787 flights on May 31st and International service on June 10th. Qatar Airways plans to have their Dreamliner’s back in the air by the end of the month. I certainly hope this is true since I am scheduled to fly on one in the middle of May from Dubai to Doha. Japanese carriers JAL and ANA, both direct victims to the battery problems, have started the battery repairs in Tokyo. A JAL, Japan Air Lines, jet started on fire while parked at Boston Logan International and fumes from a problematic battery aboard an ANA flight forced it to make an emergency landing in Japan. ANA, All Nippon Airways, is currently the largest operator of the type.

Even though the 787 groundings have led to financial losses and widespread scrutiny for Boeing, the company will actually be delivering more Dreamliner’s in the next few months than originally expected. Boeing kept producing the aircraft but the FAA wouldn’t allow delivery to the customers for obvious reasons, causing a backup in the factories. Many carriers are anxious to take delivery of the state of the art aircraft and put it into service, assuming there are no more problems. Deliveries from the manufacturer’s factories in Washington and South Carolina will resume in early May.

Here’s to smoother skies for the Dreamliner!

The Thirty Thousand Blog is written by Kyle Dunst. Like us on Facebook or follow @30ThousandBlog on Twitter.

The photo below shows all flights in the New York area inbound to JFK-International as of 8:40 PM on April 21st. The airport is currently experiencing the most significant delays of up to an hour and a half. Most transatlantic flights coming in from the East are being forced to conduct several holding patterns, allowing time to sequence them into the airport. The interesting part is that the amount of flights inbound to the airport is about one tenth it usually is and whether or not these holding patterns are necessary is questionable. Reports are buzzing all over aviation social media outlets that these delays may be being manufactured by the FAA to make a point to politicians, hoping to make them change their decision to furlough employees. If this is true, then it is ridiculous and unfair to both passengers and the airlines. These holding patterns will cost the airlines thousand of dollars in fuel and will undoubtedly cause several passengers to miss connecting flights.

If these delays are legitimate and this much sequencing is necessary to separate inbound flights into JFK, then something needs to be done quick. If our nation’s busiest international airports can only handle 30 landings an hour then our government needs to find a different way to save money. If this continues for any length of time it will be detrimental to the airlines and will cause headaches for travelers everywhere.

The Thirty Thousand Blog is written by Kyle Dunst. Like us on Facebook or follow @30ThousandBlog on Twitter.

After a small delay, the FAA announced that it has no choice but to move forward with furloughing several Air Traffic Controllers due to budget constraints. Due to the sequestration, the FAA has to cut almost $650 million out of its budget. The only way for them to do this is by furloughing, or giving a temporary unpaid leave, to many of its ATC staff. The most significant delays are expected at the major hubs in Atlanta, Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles. However, this will surely cause a ripple effect and cause delays and cancellations all over the United States. These cuts will supposedly affect upwards of 6,000 flights a day, causing a headache for everyone involved, passengers and airlines alike. Individual airlines are already starting to issue advisories to passengers including Southwest and Alaska. Long haul international flights shouldn’t be affected too much but definitely keep an eye on flight statuses if traveling.

Over in Germany, Lufthansa is being forced to cancel flights due to a planned strike by Verdi. This trade union includes over 30,000 Lufthansa Ground Staff and is calling for increased wages. The union will “walk out” on Monday, causing flight disruptions systemwide. Most flights in or out of Frankfurt, Munich, Hamburg, Stuttgart, Dusseldorf, Cologne, and Hannover will be affected. The airline has noted that flights within Germany and to European destinations are more likely to be affected. Germanwings, the airlines’ Low Cost subsidiary, shouldn’t see any disruptions. During a similar strike by the same union last month, over one third of Lufthansa’s 1800 daily flights were affected. Lufthansa plans on publishing a list of all flights expected to be affected sometime this weekend and is allowing passengers to cancel or rebook their flights at no extra cost.

Update 4/20/2013 3:32 PM EDT: 
Lufthansa has just posted the list of all affected flights. It doesn’t look good. Hundreds of flights are cancelled for April 21st – 23rd, including several long-haul international flights. See the whole list on the Lufthansa Website.

The Thirty Thousand Blog is written by Kyle Dunst. Like us on Facebook for follow @30ThousandBlog on Twitter.

Take the train downtown. Madrid, like the rest of Europe, has a very efficient public transportation system and this includes a direct rail link from the Madrid-Barajas Airport to the city center. Take the “metro” from the airport terminal to the Principe Pio station, changing trains at the Nuevos Ministerios Station. This will put you in walking distance to the Royal Palace of Madrid, our first stop on our tour of Spain’s capital.

The Royal Palace of Madrid is the official residence of the Royal Family of Spain, but is currently only used for official ceremonies. The palace, which is the second largest in Europe, is probably the most gaudy, extravagant building I have ever seen, but I still highly recommend a visit. Many of the rooms are open to the public and give you an amazing perspective as to how the royalty lives. When walking around the palace, make sure to stop by the Plaza de Oriente on the East side, just one of the city’s many famous squares.

Our first view of the massive Royal Palace of Madrid. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

The view right after you enter the Palace. You aren’t supposed to take photo’s so be conspicuous. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Just south of the Royal Palace is the Almudena Cathedral, one of the largest in the city. You should be able to take a look inside as long as you respect the people inside. When we were there, a huge church service was taking place and we still didn’t have any problems.

The exterior of the Almudena Cathedral (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Inside the Almudena Cathedral while a church service takes place (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

From the Cathedral head East on Calle Mayor, Madrid’s main street. Next up is the Mercado de San Miguel, a huge half enclosed market that sells every kind of food, drink, and snack you could ever think of. This market was completely packed on the Saturday that we were there, despite it being about 30 degrees. It is a great place to have a mid day beer or Espresso and to grab a quick snack. Right next door is the famous Plaza Mayor, which is the city’s largest and most popular square. The area is lined with both traditional Spanish and foreign restaurants and tons of shopping. All of the restaurants have a ton of outdoor seating in the square itself and this would be a great place to hang out in the summer.

Inside the packed Mercado de San Miguel (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

You can buy pretty much any kind of food at the Mercado de San Miguel. Yes, that includes an entire octopus and sea urchins. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

The Plaza Mayor is a great place to have a nice meal, especially when the weather is nice. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Continuing down Calle Mayor, the next stop is the Puerta del Sol, which I would compare to Madrid’s Times Square. It is the busiest area of the city and serves as the radial center for all of the roads in Spain. In this plaza is the famous statue of the Bear and the Madrone Tree. We couldn’t figure out why it was so famous but apparently it is an important symbol to the Spaniards. The plaza serves as the focal point for Spain’s New Years Celebration and when we were there, it served as the location for anti-government riots. Those are always reassuring when in a foreign country. (Sarcasm)

The crowded Puerta del Sol on a Saturday afternoon. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

A street performer in the Puerta del Sol. We think he was doing some sort of magic trick but to be honest, have no idea. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

The famous Bear and Madrone Tree Statue (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

From there we headed Southeast down towards the world famous Prado Museum, which is definitely worth a stop. This is probably the most well known museum in Europe other than the Louvre and contains pieces from almost every Spanish artist. You could easily spend days here if you are really into art. Obviously we only had a limited amount of time so we kept our visit to a couple of hours but we still managed to see a lot. Lucky for us, we got in for free since we’re College Students.

After visiting the Prado, we went to check out the Ritz Carlton Hotel next door where we took a quick nap on couches in the lobby. (Not kidding. We didn’t get much sleep on the relatively short red eye flight across the pond) After that we headed to the Plaza de Cibeles, which was my favorite of Madrid’s squares. Situated here is the Cibeles Palace which now serves as the town hall. This is definitely one of the coolest looking building that I have seen so far in my trips to Europe. I believe you can go up to a terrace on the roof but we didn’t have the time to try.

The Cibeles Palace at the Plaza de Cibeles. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

From the Plaza de Cibeles you can catch a bus to the Plaza de Toros, site of Madrid’s famous Bull Fights. I really hope I have the chance to return to Madrid someday to witness a fight as we were there a couple of months before the season started. You can take of the Stadium if you have the time which apparently are pretty cheap. If you are in Madrid between March and December, the bull fights are held weekly each Sunday as well as on holidays and everyday during the San Isidro Fiesta in May.

Madrid’s Plaza de Toros (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

After this, dinner time was approaching so we headed back towards the Plaza Mayor where we ate at a Belgian Pub. (Go figure) After a couple beers and some fish and chips we decided to try our Madrid’s night life, which proved to be pretty exciting. Our favorite bar was probably the Museo de Jamon which you definitely have to check out. The Museo de Jamon, which literally translates to “Ham Museum” is definitely different from bars we have here in the United States. During the day it operates as a deli serving every kind of ham you could imagine. After dark however, it turns into a crazy, packed bar serving 1 Euro Cervezas. Instead of bar nuts, you get ham chips with your drinks. There are actually several locations all around the city but we went to the large location near the Plaza Mayor.

The crazy Museo de Jamon on a Saturday night (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Not a sight you are used to seeing in bars in the US (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

The great part about night life in Madrid is that the bars are open until about 5 AM due to the Spaniard’s really weird sleep schedule. Unfortunately for us, the metro system closed without us knowing and we didn’t have an easy way to get back to the airport for our morning flight. We had to walk a pretty long ways back to the Plaza de Cibeles, which was interesting after having had a few drinks, to catch a bus to the airport. We made it back no problem and had a few hours to sleep before catching our morning flight back to Atlanta. Less than 48 hours after we left, we were back on home ground.

Climbing out of Madrid in our 767-300ER. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)

Madrid is definitely a place I would recommend visiting, even if for a short period of time. I am sure there is a lot more that we didn’t have the chance to see and hopefully I will have the chance to return sometime soon. I have created a map below that shows the route that we took and covers all of the sights that I talked about. Be prepared: it’s a lot of walking, but it’s well worth it. Enjoy Madrid!!

View Madrid Article in a larger map

It’s official. It’s booked. It’s going to happen. This May I will be visiting 5 countries, spending about 50 hours in the air, and covering a distance of 23,000 miles. I will get to try out one of the most unique airlines in the world and fly onboard the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. (assuming they stop catching on fire)

My journey will begin with the longest leg of my trip, a 16 hour flight from Atlanta to the megalopolis of Dubai in the United Arab Emirates onboard a Delta B777-200LR. Dubai is a place that I have been wanting to visit ever since I first heard about it. I will be spending about 3 days there before trying out an airline that I have always wanted to.

I will be leaving Dubai for Doha, Qatar on the world renowned Qatar Airways where I will be spending a 24 hour layover before continuing onto the small island nation of Singapore. Right now my flight from Dubai to Doha is scheduled to utilize the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner. I am really hoping that Boeing finds a solution to the battery problem before then so I can try out this brand new aircraft, albeit on a 50 minute flight. My flight from Doha to Singapore will be on one of Qatar’s semi-new Boeing 777-300ER’s, my first time flying the “W.”

After spending about a day and a half in Singapore I will be moving onto Tokyo, Japan, flying into the Narita Airport aboard another Delta B777-200LR. I hope to do a lot of airport spotting at both Tokyo-Narita and Tokyo-Haneda as well as touring the city during my 3 day stay there. I will be flying out of the Haneda airport since it is closer to downtown going thru Los Angeles on Delta’s B767-300ER. Then I will get on whatever flight I can out of LAX to get back to Atlanta, 13 days after leaving.

I can’t wait to get started on this trip and visit both the Middle East and Asia for the first time. Please let me know of any “Must Sees” in these cities if you have been there before. I will be sure to provide updates as I go along and will definitely have a lot to write about when I get back.

Frontier Airlines announced this week that commercial airline service will resume at Delaware’s New Castle Airport. The Low Cost Carrier’s return to the airport will serve as the first regularly scheduled commercial air service to the state in almost 5 years. Delta Air Lines tried to make the airport work a while ago but was forced to pull its flights to Atlanta after just a short period of time.

The state’s close proximity to several major airline hubs makes it hard for a small airport to be successful. With the high airfares that passengers face, they don’t mind driving 45 minutes to Philadelphia, or even farther to the Washington DC or New York area airports to save money.

When I first heard of the news that Frontier would start service to New Castle I was expecting a once daily flight to its Milwaukee hub or maybe a popular vacation destination in Florida. As it turns out, the airline actually plans to make the airport a Focus City. The airline plans to deploy Airbus A320′s (the largest aircraft they fly) on flights to Chicago, Houston, Orlando, and its Denver hub beginning July 1st.

Frontier recently started flights to Trenton-Mercer Airport in New Jersey, which previously had no commercial airline service. The airline says those flights are doing very well and are proving to be profitable.

Hopefully Frontier can capitalize on the fact that they have no competition at the airport and will be successful in their new route expansion.

Frontier Airlines A319 departing Atlanta. (Photo by Kyle Dunst)