Emirates A380 LoungeScreen
Business class on this airline and this plane is remarkable.
Patrick Smith

On an airplane, I mean.

You can wax nostalgic about the long-ago days of the Pan Am flying boats, when tuxedoed stewards served caviar on the finest china, and passengers retired to Pullman-style sleeping bunks (only 37 hours from New York to Rio!). But the truth is, up in the forward cabins of the world's elite airlines, flying has never been more downright luxurious than it is right now. It's a sleeker, 21st-century style of luxury, but there's no denying it.

Others agree. Maybe you caught David Owen's recent New Yorker piece, "Game of Thrones", about the investments that carriers have been making in their first and business class cabins, and the remarkable transformation of high-end business travel. Earlier this month, Joe Sharkey wrote a similar story for his "On the Road" column in the Times.


I've made this point before, almost to the letter. "If ever there was a golden age of flying," I wrote last year in a blog post, "I'd say it was right now." And chapter seven of my book says, "While people will never stop complaining about the discomforts of economy class, it happens that premium class, be it first or business, has never been more extravagant."




It was immediately obvious that this would be the swankiest airplane seat I've ever had the pleasure to experience. About the biggest compliment you can pay an airline is not wanting to get off one of its planes, and that was definitely going to be the case. Settling in, I was angry that flight would be only seven hours long. (I say "settling in," but like I told you, I'm an airline geek. My adrenaline was rushing and I spent the first fifteen minutes taking pictures. How cool is this? How cool is this?)

The seat is a full-flat sleeper with a console and minibar to one side (see photo above). It's not a totally enclosed suite like you'd find in first class, but the chair is set deeply within the cubicle. You feel cozy and ensconced, and the side console acts as a privacy barrier, putting a good deal of space between you and the aisle (or, if you're in the center section, your closest seat-mate). Window seats have thigh-level storage compartments along the side, similar to those in the upper deck of the 747.


In-flight technology isn't always easy to sort out.
Patrick Smith

Soft red cabin lighting is selected for boarding.
Patrick Smith

The cabin lighting is changed depending on the phase of flight. For boarding it's a soft red.

The purser's pre-departure announcement reminded passengers that the evening's inflight staff "speaks seventeen languages." No real surprise, Emirates being the most global of global carriers, but I have to ask: does somebody actually count?

Next came a PA from the cockpit. As with its cabin attendants, Emirates' pilots are a polyglot of expats. Our captain was a Brit and the first officer was from Jamaica.


Later, a crew member came around offering mattress pads. I declined because I didn't see the need; my seat was plenty comfortable for sleeping as it was. In the 180-degree position, there's ample tossing and turning room both at the feet and shoulders.

Behind the last row of business is a spacious lounge with a pair of sofa-style bench seats for a dozen or so passengers. The benches have seat belts, so you're welcome to stay during turbulence. That's where I had my vodka tonic. There's a full bar staffed by a flight attendant, and a countertop spread of pastries and hors d'oeuvres.

Welcome to the bar in the lounge.
Patrick Smith

The sofas have seat belts.
Patrick Smith

Snacks are set out for the flight.
Patrick Smith

Now, as maybe you've noted from the photos, Emirates' cabin decor isn't in line with everybody's tastes. The details are a touch ostentatious, in a certain Arabian-luxe sort of way. But it's hard to complain. As you're sitting there, all that gold trim and gleaming faux-wood only enhances one's guilty pleasure. As my old friend James Kaplan once put it, it's Vegas, but Vegas in a good way.

(And as something of an aside, you might notice that Emirates is one of only a few carriers to have developed its own proprietary typeface, which it uses in everything from its advertising to its inflight menu. I don't know who designed this font, but it's very attractive and distinctive. In an era when carriers are becoming more and more similar to one another, it's a small but elegant way for Emirates to set itself apart. More airlines should do this kind of thing.)

I've been ridiculing the A380 for years, calling it, among other insults, "a travesty of industrial design" and "the ugliest commercial jetliner ever built." It remains both of those things, at least on the outside. On the inside, however, I have to admit there's little to complain about: the plane is spacious and comfortable.

It's also remarkably quiet - maybe the quietest jet I've ever flown on. Even during takeoff the only sound was a deep, distant rumble and some rattling from the galley.


The opulence extends to the lavatories.
Patrick Smith

The fifth and final leg of my round-the-world journey was a 13-hour nonstop from Dubai to Boston. Emirates began its Boston service this spring using a once-daily Boeing 777-200. The airline has around 150 777s, but relatively few of the smaller -200 variants. Already the Boston service is popular, especially with passengers connecting to and from India, and I won't be surprised to see a -300 on the route soon.

Business class on this aircraft isn't nearly as fancy as on the A380. It's a standard, forward-facing recliner with a retractable privacy barrier — comfortable, though a bit of a let-down after being so spoiled on the A380. And seven-abreast (2-3-2) is a rather tight fit on a 777, even with a full-flat sleeper.

Business class on a Boeing 777 is a bit of a letdown after the A380.
Patrick Smith

By the way, those side-mounted screens you see above, and in the earlier photo of the A380′s console and minibar, are the removable seat control panels, not the ICE video screens, which are much larger and mounted to the seat-back in front of you.

The 777 has textured sidewalls and constellation patterns that illuminate through the ceiling panels. The bulkheads are decorated with fresh flowers (I checked; they were real) and a desert dune motif.

The 777's bulkheads have stars.
Patrick Smith

The 777 windows have beautiful trim.
Patrick Smith

Now, for some nitpicking…

Emirates' business class amenities kit is the largest I've ever seen, though not necessarily the best stocked. Two essentials are conspicuously absent: earplugs and a pen. And somewhat oddly, slipper-socks and eyeshades are supplied separately, in a plastic bag of their own.



According to the menu there was supposed to be a midflight meal called "Light Bites," with a choice of a spinach calzone, chili prawns, or methi chicken. But passing the eight hour mark nothing had been served. After hungrily waiting around, I walked up to the galley and politely inquired. "Oh," said the flight attendant. "Did you want that? I can make it for you."

Apparently you have to ask?


While the service felt disjointed, the staff were nonetheless gracious and attentive. Despite having to ask for that snack, there was never a time when a flight attendant wasn't nearby. Walk-throughs were constant. In this regard there is no comparison with most American carriers, where, once the meal service is over, cabin crew promptly disappear.

An engine on an Emirates jumbo jet.
Patrick Smith


The carrier's slogan is "Hello Tomorrow," which I find annoying. Clearly its slogan ought to be "The Airline of Planet Earth." (Note: This is my idea, and if the airline ever adopts this motto, I expect recognition in the form of at least two business class — nay, first class — tickets annually, valid anywhere in the company's network!)

Though I have to say, I was quite underwhelmed by Dubai airport. Emirates' celebrated concourse A, opened in 2013, manages to feel awfully claustrophobic for such a gigantic building. There are too many shops and not enough pedestrian space, with overcrowded corridors and absolutely nowhere to relax, every gate and seating area jam-packed with passengers and their endlessly shrieking children.

Speaking of children, to escape the racket I found myself at an Emirates souvenir shop, where the little kid in me couldn't resist spending $50 on the latest addition to my toy airplane collection. Thus, my A380 journey was officially commemorated in 1/400-scale die-cast:

The newest member of my collection.
Patrick Smith

Funny. Here's something I used to do as a kid:


As a global crossroads, my city-state needed a strategic location, equidistant between the world's most populous regions. The spot I picked was along the Mediterranean coast of eastern Libya, where an atlas told me (perhaps not entirely accurately) there was ample empty space and access to the sea.




I went so far as to determine which aircraft types were assigned to various routes, and drew meticulous seat maps (two-class cabins on the shorter routes, three classes for the long-hauls). Each individual plane was christened after a different world city, mountain peak or river, and this name would be lettered along the forward fuselage — in the style of KLM's planes ("Kilimanjaro" — what a fantastic name for a jetliner). Naturally we had a lot of 747s.

I created blueprints for a spectacular hub airport, including detailed sketches of the terminal and the world's grandest control tower. There would be two pairs of runways, parallel-staggered so that planes never had to cross the adjacent strip. Advanced 3-D versions of this airport involved a terminal built with Legos and runways laid out with masking tape.

And so on.



You could say I'm into both. I love what I do for a living, don't get me wrong, but I also would enjoy being on the side of the business that builds, plans and strategizes. I want to be the guy who launches the new routes and decides which planes to deploy on them. (Why does no US carrier fly to Poland? Mine would.) I want to be the person who chooses the livery and logo; the person who picks the seat designs and the color schemes in the cabin (green; we don't see enough green). I'd be good, I think, at branding.

Some of my early work.
Patrick Smith



I don't care, it's still a neat idea. Maybe Richard Branson or somebody could make it work.

Most of you would amazed by the sheer number of airlines that already do exist in the world. We can haggle over the definition of an airline, but My J.P. Worldwide Airline Fleet Directory is over seven-hundred pages long, with detailed entries for nearly three thousand commercial operators on six continents — from giants like United, Delta, and the aforementioned Emirates, to single-plane bush outfits in Tanzania. I'll pick the volume up, open to a random page and start scanning. I'm ashamed to admit how much time I can spend with this book.


"Niche carrier" is a term we don't hear much anymore. These are small independent airlines in business to serve a very specific market. They are content in their smallness, able to make do without fancy code-shares or partnerships. They're still out there, even in America.


Cape Air is maybe the closest thing to what we used to call a "commuter airline." Today we hear of "regional airlines," but this is a relatively new term, and really a new business model. The commuters, as we knew them, carried people from small, outlying cities into the majors' hubs. (Here in the Northeast we had Bar Harbor Airlines, Air New England, Pilgrim and PBA.) Commuters fed the major carrier networks, they did not fly on behalf of them. The commuters went where the majors couldn't. You rode a commuter plane from Pasco to Seattle, or from Rutland to Boston. You didn't ride one from New York to Houston, the way you can nowadays.


Over the past two decades the regional sector has come to account for a full fifty percent — one half — of all commercial departures in America. That's simply astonishing. How did this happen?


It's good and bad for the passenger, I guess. There are RJs going everywhere, all the time. They're fast and safe and relatively comfortable (certainly compared to the commuter planes of old). On the downside, they're an inefficient use of air and ground space, and a prime contributor to congestion and delays.

Getting back to that desktop airline of my youth, with my route maps and Legos. How old was I, you're wondering? I'm not saying, except that I was probably older than I should have been.

I still dabble in imaginary airlines from time to time, if I've got nothing to do or if somebody sticks a blank sheet of paper in front of me. I sketch routes, logos, liveries and the occasional seating diagram. For example, the South American nation of Guyana no longer has its own national airline. So, bored one night at my desk, I invented one. Its logo and livery were an adaptation of the "Golden Arrow" of the Guyanese flag. Yellow and green. Miami, Port of Spain, New York and Toronto (a lot of expat Guyanese in YYZ) were on the route map. Cessna Caravans had the in-country routes, and a Dash-8 few daily up to Caracas and over to Paramaribo. Could an old 767-200 make money on a route between Georgetown and London, maybe with a stopover in Trinidad? I'm not sure. But it's fun to think about.