Virgin A330 neo Upper Class from London Heathrow to Tampa flight review with Tom Otley, Editor, Business Traveller magazine UK. November 2022.
Full review on
www.businesstraveller.com/tri...
Virgin has ordered a total of 16 A330 neo aircraft for its long haul aircraft, configured, at least initially, in three classes in economy, premium economy and business (Upper Class). The ‘neo’ stands for new engine option (in this case, Rolls Royce Trent 7000 engines), and along with improvements to the wing delivers an 11 per cent improvement in fuel efficiency over the existing A330 aircraft in Virgin’s fleet, and a 50 per cent improvement in noise.
This was the inaugural flight to Tampa, which started in November, initially four times a week and then moving to daily times from November 28, 2022. Our flight was also moved forward in the day to allow for the press conference at the other end. The normal flight time is 1330 but this flight departed at 0800.
You can read full review here: www.businesstraveller.com/tri...
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- Hello, my name's Tom Otley and welcome to the latest of our flight reviews. Today we are flying on the New Virgin A330 Neo to Tampa in Florida from London Heathrow. It's about a 10-hour flight, so we'll have plenty of time to try out the seat, both in terms of sitting in it, working, watching the in-flight entertainment, eating, but then also having a sleep, because it does go fully flat, and with it being a 10-hour flight would be great to catch some sleep in the afternoon before we land. The first thing to say about this seat is it's completely new for Virgin Atlantic. Their old seats and the seat that you'll see on the majority of their fleet is a herring bone seat that refers to what it looks like from above, the configuration. Then you have a herringbone or reverse herringbone and reverses when you're facing the window, and the window seats, and normal is when you are facing away from the seats. This seat isn't one of those, it's forward facing and it's an off-the-shelf seat, actually, it's called a Thompson VantageXL seat. You know, they've adapted it slightly, they've put doors on it, which is one of the options, but it's a standard seating you will see on many airlines. The way that it works, in terms of configuration, and you'll see this if you look from the front, is that each seat is sort of staggered left and right as you go back. And the reason for that is that when you recline the seat your feet go forward into a space, an enclosed space, that actually forms the side table of the seat in front. It's kind of a neat way of getting around the fact of how do you maximize the space on the plane when everyone wants to sleep and, you know, go fully flat. The advantage of that, other than the fact that you get a fully flat bed, is that the side table is quite wide, because it has to be, cause you've gotta fit someone's feet in and they've gotta be able to turn over when they're sleeping. So you get this large side table, which means that you can be, for instance, working and then the food comes, you just put your laptop to one side or all your items and you've got, you know, the tables there, the tray table to eat from. So that's a good thing. But the reason why they've had to go for something like this, a Thompson VantageXL, and so has their sister airline Delta is the A330 fuselage like is slightly narrower than say a 777 or an A350 or a 787. So they couldn't fit those bigger seats in. So when you think of the configuration of this one it's still one two one, which is A-D-G-K, the letters, and it's all got direct aisle access, which is the important thing which you can get in and out without climbing over someone. But it also means that it's not, you know, the widest or the most spacious seat that you're gonna get in Upper class. So for instance, if I look forward here, the seat in front, the back of it, I can touch it. So what? Well it means that, you know, there's a slight sense of claustrophobia, particularly if the door, the privacy door is shut as well. And, you know, for that reason, I imagine there's some people who are slightly claustrophobic won't want that door shut. That's fine because it's an option. It's left open, well locked open for takeoff or landing and then you have the option of opening and closing it. If you're in a center seat, like me, you've also got this privacy screen. These seats would be great, if you were traveling with a couple or in a couple. But obviously if you're not, you want that privacy, and the moment you do take off and landing, once you've done takeoff, you can lift that up, then you've got privacy. And that's important because if you think, like I sit up now, if I was filming this, the lady next to me would be directly, you know, in the line of sight. So you do need that. That s