Linda's Flight to Portugal

Linda's flight left at about 2 p.m. from Minneapolis and took her to Philadelphia.  From there, U.S. Air flies directly to Lisbon.  The actual trans-Atlantic flight is only about six and a half hours as compared to our usual seven and a half or eight hours to Amsterdam or Paris.

She left just about on time, although after spending about a half hour on the taxiways before takeoff.  I tracked the flight on FlightAware.com  Here are the top flight tracking websites.


FlightAware is a fun site to use because it gives up-to-the-minute data on altitude, speed, heading and position.  Here she has just taken off, crossed the Jersey shore, and is at 21,900 feet (Flight Level 219 and 466 knots speed are visible in the second line of green print under the plane.)


Her plane joins the large contingent of flights that cross the Atlantic from West to East every night.  Her plane will be staying south of most of them.  Flight Tracker loses real-time tracking about three hours into the flight and provides only estimated data until the plane lands.


After six hours and eleven minutes, Flight Aware confirms that she has arrived. 





I'm still waiting for a text message from her but I know she is on the ground.

Update: a bit later.

• The delay leaving Philly was due to a fox on the runway
• The delay in texting her arrival was due to a long passport line.