Anyone have experience with Icelandair?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Next August, my mom and I will have to fly from the DC area to London for the start of a transatlantic cruise. I’ve started checking out airfares, and I saw that Icelandair is about $1000 less than other carriers - that’s a significant chunk of change for 2 retirees.

I went to a site that had comments by those who have flown the airline, and they were all over the place. Things like the person who rated them 1 out of 10 because a kid kicked the back of the seat the whole way - yeah, that’s the airline’s fault… :rolleyes: Some people complained about rude flight attendants, but I don’t even know what that means - I expect some demanding prisses would consider anything short of constant fawning to be rude.

But, oddly enough, I trust Dopers… mostly… sorta. :smiley: And if any of you have flown transatlantic via Keflavik, I’d be interested in your experience. In fact, and recommendations of other carriers to consider would be appreciated. We’re far enough out that we can take some time to research and shop, and it’d be nice to start our vacation with a good experience. Thanks!

2

I’ve never flown then transatlantic, but I have flown them to Iceland. They’re not “luxurious”, but nothing comes to mind as being bad. I like them (but I still fly Air France for the food :slight_smile: .)

If you get a long stopover, you can sneak in a trip to the Blue Lagoon, which is nice.

Plus their in-flight entertainment centre has all of the episodes of LazyTown.

3

I flew with them last summer. No complaints, but they are strictly no-frills and tend to nickel-and-dime for most of the amenities that are usually free on transatlantic flights. You WILL have to pay extra for food, headphones, and such (or bring your own or do without).

But the big, big perk is the fact that you can get a stopover in Iceland at no extra charge (well, beyond what you will spend in Iceland, which can be considerable :)). This is worth doing for its own sake, but it also means that you can arrange your flights so that you arrive in the late evening and leave in the daytime: in other words, you can get to Europe without spending the night on a plane. As someone who cannot sleep in airline seats, I think it was the only transatlantic flight I’ve ever taken that wasn’t pure hell. (Also, they tend to be smaller planes, so you’re not crammed into the middle of a five-across row of seats in the center of the plane.)

4

The stopover in Iceland for the flight we’re considering is about 80 minutes. But the cruise back from the British Isles to New York will make 3 stops in Iceland, so I’ll get to see a bunch of the cool stuff then.

I don’t think the idea of no-frills will bother either of us - I expect we’ll be trying to sleep as much as possible anyway. We can carry water and some snack bars to hold us over till we get to London, so I’m not too concerned about that. Honestly, our biggest concern is safety, but I don’t recall hearing anything in the news about Icelandair jets falling out of the sky, so there’s that. :smiley:

5

It’s as safe as any US airline. It complies with all required standards and the FAA wouldn’t let it operate from the US if it didn’t. Same applies to the European aviation regulators.

6

I could tell you how good it was in or about 1981-1986. :smiley:

7

We took it both ways [Boston - Frankfort] 3 years ago and enjoyed it. I am handicapped - wheelchair on most days with occasional good days of crutches, and can transfer myself. We requested wheelchair assistance at both ends and in the middle, and got it. We had asked for a specific seating [seat row 8 in this seatguru page] and got it from US to Germany, but the route home they goofed and even though we had requested and gotten tickets for the pair of seats on the return, they double booked them or something and some other people had them, so they moved us up one row where we actually had all 3 seats because they were not booked solid.

As was pointed out, they use narrowbody jets so they don’t have the morass of 5 row seating hell in the middle. We flew more or less the overnight so it was very easy to sleep [I find it difficult to sleep in a vehicle normally, and day trips it is pretty much impossible for me to fall asleep]

The staff were wonderful, polite, spoke excellent english [and the porter from the Germany to US leg schlepping me at warp speed through the airport was great, even if I did get picked for extra screening, though they actually were very casual about it - almost apologetic that the TSA were making them do this to me and I got a tourist DVD out of the deal =) ]

8

If we happen to travel back in time, you’re the first one I’ll contact! :wink:

Thanks, all, for the replies. It’s looking like saving $1K per ticket doesn’t mean we’ll be in the cargo hold!

9

My sister flew Icelandair a couple of times(I believe the same flight you’re talking about) but that was in the late 90’s. She really liked it then, but I couldn’t tell you anything specific and I’m sure a bunch has changed since then anyway.

10

Also flew with them ages ago to Europe - twice!

First story - decided to stay over night in Iceland and take them up on the special offer they make for tourists. We had a perfect, peaceful flight and landed nice and smooth.

Got out of the plane and it was practically a hurricane going on!
Even the bus we took to Reykjavik was swaying a tad on the way in and I asked one of the airline stewards how the weather could be so horrible and yet the plane landed as if it were a calm day!

He said, “We are used to this weather, and so are the pilots - they can land in much worse weather and you will never know it until you get off the plane!”

So there is that - pilots who are used to taking off and landing in hurricanes.

Second story - on my next flight to Europe, we did well from NYC to Iceland and then took off from Iceland to Luxembourg.

Somewhere along the line, one of the engines caught on fire - not a good thing - and suddenly all the engines were turned off and we were going at a nice clip, sort of heading downwards. At that point, I was sure I was going to die and was quite comfortable and calm and resigned to the impending crash.

However, soon I heard a couple of engines (not the burning one) sort of cough and sputter and come back to life - and voila - we were airborne again! Everyone else heaved a great sigh of relief.

Unfortunately, I was then a nervous wreck - along with a woman sitting a few rows behind me - and the two of us had to be helped from the plane as I could barely breathe, let alone stand and walk off the plane. One of the causes of future fear of flying on my part

But once again - the pilots did exactly what they had to do to get that plane safely onto the ground.

So - based on those two stories, I guess I can give them a thumbs up! I mean, if they can land during hurricanes and with burning engines, I guess you can trust them to do quite well under more, uh, normal circumstances.

Last memory of one of those flights - I wanted to buy a drink and, at the time, I think it cost a dollar and I happened to have 10 dimes on me. Wanted to get rid of all American coins so I handed them to the flight attendant, she gave me my drink, and then about five minutes later came back and gave me the dimes back and said, “I am sorry, but we can’t accept these.”
“Why?” I asked.
“Well, it doesn’t say how much they are worth.”

I was sort of surprised but then looked at the coin closely. Sure enough, it is the one US coin that does NOT say how many cents - a nickel says “five cents” and a quarter says “25 cents” and even a penny says, “one cent” but a dime simply states, “one dime” - and I guess if you are from a foreign country (Iceland) and don’t know US currency all that well, then a dime could just as easily be worth 1/4 of a penny for all they know.

At any rate - take the flight! They will be just fine!

11

Yup, perfectly fine. My only complaint is that they have now started charging for in-flight meals, which I see as silly on a transatlantic flight. On the other hand, they have a generous free baggage allowance. Their planes are smaller than most other transatlantic services, but you do get to get out in Iceland and that reduces the claustrophobia quite a bit.

There was a short time when the transfer in Iceland was a hassle, especially going to the US, but they have improved it considerably.

12

What happened there? I’m taking my first transatlantic flight (On Icelandair, FWIW) in a few days, and I’m curious about what “extra screening” is, and why a porter would be part of it.

13

I went to Iceland a couple months ago and flew Icelandair both ways. I’m perfectly happy flying Spirit or whatever’s cheapest. Icelandair seemed quite nice. They give you a free bottle of Icelandic water before the flight, which saves you having to buy a 7$ bottle in the airport.

14

Their fleet is all 757’s, which aren’t the most comfortable for the long-legged, but it’s only for a few hours.

Have fun!

15

My mom is 5’4" and I’m 5’5" - long legs aren’t an issue for us! :smiley:

16

I just flew Icelandair last summer and it was perfectly serviceable. The talk about having to pay for food was true, but you could bring your own food. And your own headphones for the in-flight entertainment (which was in the seatback ahead of you. So everyone got to watch what they wanted.

I actually flew there for a vacation in Iceland and we learned a LOT about Iceland during the tour. Iceland has a total population of about 320,000 people. That’s THOUSAND, not MILLION. So one thought that kept going through my mind: How can a country with only 320,000 people have a functioning, safe airline???

But it seemed to be fine. :slight_smile:

J.

17

I travel with my wheelchair, and they prefer that it get checked through so I need an airport supplied porter with a wheelchair to get me from one place to another.

And the TSA has determined that on flights incoming to the US, a certain random number get screened in addition to running us through the normal security measures. So I got escorted into a room, they went through my hand luggage and swiped me for explosives residue, and wanded me for metal. It was explained that over the course of 24 hours, they needed to randomly screen like 5 men and 5 women. So I got to go through extra screening even though I was not leaving the secured area of the airport - being in the run between one plane to the next by being hauled by an airport employee and having already gone through the basic security checkpoint in Frankfurt. :rolleyes:

18

I thought of that too. A PeoriaAir or SouthBendAir with 30 or so jets could never be financially sustainable.

19

My daughter flew on Icelandair when she went on a school trip to Europe.
She says it was a reallly enjoyable experience, especially with the freee bottle of water you recieve. They also give comfortable pillows if you are flying overnight ad have a nice selection of movies and TV shows available. The chairs were ok to sleep in, and the flight attendants were helpful and spoke good English.
Her only complaint was a rude Danish man who sat next to her on the return flight.

20

I just took a transatlantic trip using Icelandair, I have no complaints. I flew economy class, the seats weren’t tiny and each passenger got their own little tv set in the headrest in front of them that had a wide selection of free music and movies. They do charge for headphones, but the stewardess gave me mine for free for some reason.

I was very impressed with the prices. I got from the U.S. to Iceland for $400 and from Iceland to Amsterdam for less than $300.

I wish I would have flown Icelandair home. I’d also like to take this opportunity to bash Aer Lingus. They were awful in every way you can imagine an airline being.