Copa is an interesting airline to get to know. Based at the junction of two continents, the Panamanian carrier found its niche connecting the Americas from north to south. It operates a single-type fleet of around 100 Boeing 737s. But compared with other all-737 airlines that follow a low-cost carrier model, Copa is a different beast. It’s a full-service airline with premium cabins and some of the lengthiest 737 routes out there.
As with most of the world’s 737-based airlines, Copa went in big on the MAX, and it was heavily affected by the past few years’ MAX drama. On the bright side, the airline put its best foot forward with the MAX, debuting a brand-new premium cabin branded as “Dreams” business class. The Dreams seat was designed for Copa’s medium-haul services, the four- to seven-hour flights where quality sleep is a big deal.
We got a chance to try Copa and their new MAX seats on a recent trip. We also got to explore the relatively new terminal at the airline’s Panama City hub. The trip hit a snafu midway through, which we’ll get to later. But in the end we still got a good feel for the airline, its new seat design, and the freshest updates to its home airport.
Read on for more on our time flying with Copa and exploring the airport in Panama City.
A Lufthansa A350 taxiing to the terminal at SEA on its inaugural flight from Munich
New route launches are always exciting, both for travelers wanting to visit the new location, and for we AvGeeks who get to cover the event itself.
On May 31, Lufthansa launched new nonstop service between Seattle and Munich, using A350s for the route. The airline already provides daily service between Seattle and Frankfurt, with that route having been established back in 2008; it is flown with A330s and A340s.
Flight LH488 arrived at SEA to a traditional water-turret salute from the airport fire department
The new service runs SEA-MUH as flight LH488 on Tuesdays, Fridays, and Sundays, departing at 6:50 pm and arriving in Munich at 1:45 pm the following day. The MUC-SEA leg is LH488, running every Tuesday, Friday, and Sunday with a 3:30 pm departure and a 4:59 pm arrival into Seattle.
Don Bunkenburg/Senior Director Sales USA Central, West & Central America Lufthansa GroupRick Duncan/SEA Airport Director, Aviation Business & PropertiesA traditional ribbon cutting was held at the departure gate
Being in the terminal with all my cameras, I couldn’t resist photographing other planes.
Speaking of Germany, Condor also had a plane at the gate for its daily service to Frankfurt
The Lufthansa inaugural marks the third new international service for SEA in 2024 (the first two this year were Hainan’s service to Chonqing and Alaska Airlines service to Toronto), bringing the total to 50 services to 33 international destinations on 25 different airlines.
One of SEA’s airport fire trucks arriving at the gate for the water-cannon salute
Two fire trucks were stationed at each side of the gate to provide an arch via their water cannons for the inaugural arrival.
D-AIXP touching down in Seattle on its inaugural flight from Munich
It was a beautiful day to be out on the ramp to document the arrival.
I love writing about long-haul premium economy. Mostly because the judgement comes down to one straightforward question: does the product feel like economy with a bit of extra, or more like business class lite? Seats in the first category do enough to take the pain out of the coach class space crunch. Which, to be fair, is what premium economy was designed to do. But seats in that second category delight in their own right, enough that you might even go out of your way to fly them.
We put Cathay Pacific’s long-haul premium economy to that test over the course of two flights on their Airbus A350 subfleet. Those planes are capable of handling some seriously lengthy routes. In our case, between a flight from New York to Hong Kong and then a connection on to Sydney, we spent over 25 hours onboard.
What did we think after all that time putting the seat and service to the test? Read on to find out. Plus we have plenty of video, including a nose-cam and tail-cam treat at the end.
April 2nd Author’s Note : Thanks for enjoying a bit of April Fools’ fun with us. You AvGeeks know that that’s NOT what a 777 looks like. But fake news is a problem out there. And so to make sure nobody gets confused we’re putting in this disclaimer to make it clear to everyone.
The embattled aircraft manufacturer Boeing today announced that it discovered a major manufacturing error on one of its aircraft. While the planemaker’s issues to date largely focused on the 737 MAX, this morning’s news related to a larger member of its lineup, the 777. The triple-seven is arguably Boeing’s most commercially successful widebody aircraft, making today’s announcement particularly troublesome.
Boeing’s Everett production facility, where the 777 is assembled (photo: Boeing)
Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun, who will be stepping down from his role at the end of this year as part of a major company shake-up, held a press conference this morning regarding this development.
“A manufacturing anomaly made it past our quality controls on the 777 production line,” Calhoun admitted. “A few major components of this particular 777-300ER aircraft were installed in the wrong location, and it was only shortly before delivery that those abnormalities were discovered.”
Boeing CEO Dave Calhoun answering questions after today’s press conference
AirlineReporter was able to obtain an exclusive leaked image of the aircraft in question. It appears that two forward fuselage sections were installed underneath the wings in place of the aircraft’s engines. Furthermore, an unusually large variant of General Electric’s GE90 engine appears to have been installed in place of the cockpit at the front of the aircraft.
Images obtained of the affected aircraft.
A Boeing employee who asked to remain anonymous noted “I walked up to the plane when it arrived at the plant’s completion and delivery center and … well something just didn’t feel right. I couldn’t put my finger on exactly what it was. But I’m glad that we spoke up.”
This model demonstrates the correct locations of the 777’s cockpit and engines.
Aircraft safety expert Faye Kinuse remarked “This was a scary near miss. If the mistake hadn’t been discovered and any pilot attempted to operate the aircraft, who knows what could have happened.”
Furthermore, other similarly significant manufacturing errors have been found in 777s that are operating today. A whistleblower pointed authorities to an aircraft operated by Emirates, which owns the world’s biggest 777 fleet. The plane in question, delivered two years ago, appears to have unintended additional sections included in its fuselage.
When reached for comment about the discovery, a Boeing spokesperson noted that “while this error is regrettable, on the bright side this aircraft offers unparalleled economics on a per-seat basis.”
While Airbus had previously remained above the fray of Boeing’s manufacturing woes, it appears that some of their airplanes may harbor similarly severe assembly problems. Members of the planespotting community in Frankfurt, Germany recently posted photos taken of a Lufthansa Airbus A380 with six more engines than normal.
“We were understandably alarmed when we were alerted about the issue,” said Lufthansa spokesperson Öpse Deise. “However it now makes sense why that particular aircraft cruises at Mach 3.”
Airbus held a press conference to express regret for the error. Striking a more upbeat note, the company pointed to its new A3 line of aircraft, designed with environmental sustainability in mind. As a shortened version of the A320 family it is small enough to be propelled by its passengers via bicycle pedal power, giving it a net-zero carbon footprint.
Editor’s Note: Happy April Fools’ everyone, thanks for sharing in a bit of fun with us. We hope you liked revisiting those crazy airplane photoshops that were big on YouTube and message boards years ago. Thanks and credit to the people behind the images we used, including @SwiftOnSecurityand the Infinite Flight message board, though a lot of those photos were posted anonymously.Also kudos to those of you who noticed that our Dave Calhoun pic was actually actor Wallace Shawn.
It’s been a good while since I’ve done a Learning to Fly post. Since the last time, I’ve completed my first biennial flight review, which is a mandatory mini-checkride done every two years with a flight instructor, that’s designed to verify that a pilot has properly maintained both their flying skills and regulatory knowledge.
I’ve been doing a ton of local flying around Puget Sound, plus a few flights over the mountains to central Washington state, all via rented aircraft from Galvin Flying.
Because of the Pacific Northwest’s consistently lousy winter weather, with very low clouds, rain, and low visibility, it had been a couple months since my last flight. So I booked some time with a trusted CFI and got lucky with a nice weather window, and off we went to do some practice.
I honestly miss the structure of flight training. You could expect to be constantly challenged, and asked to randomly perform flight maneuvers or emergency procedures. There are still plenty of challenges when flying on your own, but you soon settle into comfortable routines.
Our flight track from Flightradar24 – the first one is our pattern work, the second is the entire flight
Our training flight first consisted of three laps around the traffic pattern at Seattle’s Boeing Field doing touch-and-go landings, then we exited the pattern and flew to one of our local practice areas, the one we refer to as northeast practice, as it lies to the northeast of BFI. We also have west practice, which is across Puget Sound and east of the Bremerton airport, and southeast practice, which is, perhaps unsurprisingly, southeast of BFI and east of Auburn airport.
A lot of my own flying has been to the southwest over to Tacoma Narrows Airport, or northwest along the Olympic Peninsula to Jefferson County Airport in Port Townsend, so we went northeast for something of a change, plus the transit time is the shortest of the three training areas.
Traffic is always a concern when flying in congested airspace; going out on the first good afternoon following a spell of bad weather always means there is plenty of traffic to keep an eye on
The Cessna 172 we flew that day was equipped with a Garmin G1000 instrumentation and navigation system, which includes traffic. The arrows on the screen above represent aircraft in the area as we were leaving the practice area and descending to stay well beneath SEA’s overhead Bravo airspace when we were returning to BFI. The extended line from each arrow shows direction of travel, and the numbers indicate the altitude above or below your own; super handy info to augment what you’re seeing out the windshield.
Sitting at the hold-short line, waiting for takeoff clearance. Photo by Adam KephartDowntown Seattle and Puget Sound. Photo by Adam KephartMount Rainier makes an excellent reference point for doing maneuvers over the northeast practice area
There was nothing crazy or groundbreaking about the flight. We did some touch-and-go landings, then went out to the practice area and did a couple of stalls (one power-off approach to landing stall, and one power-on departure stall), and then headed back.
Adam the CFI took the controls so I could grab a few photos
It’s focused practice flights such as these that keeps you safe as a pilot, and keeps your basic proficiency levels up to standard. I’ll go out again with Adam this spring to do some simulated emergencies to keep those skills sharp, too.
And I’ll leave you with one more photo of one of my favorite views ever. More soon — summer is coming.
Just about to touch down on 14L at the end of the flight. Photo by Adam Kephart.
