Review: American Eagle E175 Basic Economy | BloxfilmOne
RGV Jetsetter
4 min read
I have not been paid by any entity in any way (financially, benefits) to write the following post.
As a loyal United frequent flyer, I always disorient myself flying anybody that isn’t United or a Star Alliance member. Unfortunately, United has recently been completely unreasonable with their fares, and since I have to go to New York, I ended up having to fly with American and Delta to get to NYC. But to make it interesting, I set up a stopover in Chicago and bought Delta First Class to get into NYC in style. With that being said, welcome to the Jetting to NYC series.
Airline: American Eagle
Flight: AA 3306
Aircraft: Embraer ERJ-175
Registration: N227NN
Route: McAllen (MFE) – Dallas/Ft. Worth (DFW)
We start this journey at my hometown airport of McAllen Miller International Airport (MFE) in the beautiful border city of McAllen, Texas. This is one of three airports in Texas’ Rio Grande Valley region, the others being Valley International Airport (HRL) in Harlingen and Brownsville/South Padre Island International Airport (BRO) in Brownsville. McAllen was renovated and expanded in order to handle the increasing passenger traffic, and this expansion resulted into nice changes that really improve the ambiance of the airport.
Having gotten to the airport a little early, I had a chance to catch up on some work. I also got a coffee and an unrecommended pasta salad since I had skipped meals due to school and work.
Most of the passengers were waiting at Gate 2, which showed the American flight despite it being a United gate. Sure enough, the plane landed and arrived at American’s Gate 6, and comically an entire herd of travellers made moved like a school of fish to the new gate.
Now I was flying American’s Basic Economy, meaning I was in Group 9, which I didn’t even know existed! I then felt insulted since they didn’t even bother calling Group 9 to board (sarcasm intended). In many ways, American’s Basic Economy is a superior deal compared to United. American allows you to take one carry on and a personal item onboard while United charges you for “overhead bin space”. Not only that, but both airlines charge about the same for Basic Economy, or at least they did on my fare to Chicago, but American won out because I wouldn’t have to pay an additional fee for taking my carry on onboard! American’s restrictions on Basic Economy fares can be found on their website right here, while United’s can be found here.
As I was boarding, I took the chance to snap a pic of the plane as the sun hit us a just the right angle.
Soon we were all onboard and ready for the one hour flight up to Dallas. We taxiied out to the runway, lined up, and soared into the skies above the RGV.
In the air, I took the time to snap some pics of the sky, which you can see on my Flickr account and my Instagram!
After a few minutes in the air, the crew got up and served us drinks and pretzels on this short 1 hour flight to Dallas.
Also, like United and Delta, American is moving away from seatback entertainment and implementing BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) entertainment. Wifi is available for purchase, as well as free movies! Also, you can use American’s website and app for free to look at flight info, just like United and Delta. More information on American’s service can be found here.
I ended up purchasing wifi to work on some assignments and to catch up on work, and took some time to check out our flight path on the Flightradar24 app.
As nighttime settled in, we began descending into the Dallas/Ft. Worth area. It had been a while since I had landed in Dallas, the last time being the last week of the International First Class Dining Room’s existence in the Terminal D Admirals Club.
We were finally on our final descent into DFW, and of course I caught the “action” and uploaded it to my YouTube channel, where you can see other landings and takeoffs!
We pulled into our gate in Dallas/Ft. Worth, pulling into terminal B, next to another E175 about 7 minutes late.
This ended the first part of the journey to NYC, giving me a chance to snap a pic of our plane at the gate as I made my way to my connecting flight to Chicago.
Verdict
American Airlines’ Basic Economy is a fantastic deal compared to United, and that honestly was the dealbreaker in this case. Despite being a United 1K, the prices were just too high for me to accept, and I am glad to have experienced American’s Basic Economy so I could share with you!
What are your thoughts? Let me know in the comment section below! Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed it, follow us on our social media accounts located in the sidebar, and please share share share!
As always, remember to keep living life one trip at a time!
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