Continuing Our Recent Scandinavian Theme....

I'm writing this on a plane. It's a Scandinavian Airlines System plane (SAS being the joint carrier of Sweden, Denmark and Norway in case you wondered), and I'm on it flying from Amsterdam to Stockholm because I got away from the office late and missed the KLM flight I was supposed to be taking. As a shorthaul flight, it's essentially undivided physically, though there are three travel classes; Economy (cheap, inflexible), Economy Flex (less cheap, more flexible) and Business Class. By the time I pitched up at the airport there were none of the first group of seats left, so here I am, the only passenger in the entire front two classes of travel. That's right - there's me and no one else between here and the front of the plane, and worse, I'm about seven rows from the first row of Economy, so unless I stand up and look around, from every perspective, it feels like I'm on a ghost plane. When the stewardess looking after me and no one else was talking to me I pointed out how embarrassed I felt, and she said "Thank god you're here or I'd have nothing to do."

So I've got fantasic service, a lovely, friendly attendant, and the oddest, creepiest environment I can ever remember being in. It feels strangely like if I went up to the flight deck I'd find that there's no one flying the plane....

Posted on March 23, 2006 12:07 AM

What do you think? (Comments must be approved before they will appear.)