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China eastern airlines...?


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I'm flying from Shanghai to London with China eastern airlines. Ive heard some pretty terrible reviews. Anyone got any idea what I'm letting myself in for? Also, does anyone know what the flight time from Shanghai to London is?

Travel Tips
China Eastern is not bad, but is not like other airlines in the region, like Singapore Airlines, ANA or Cathay Pacific.
China Eastern flight to London is very popular with Australian tourist, the Sydney,Shanghai-London flight is cheaper than other airlines. " We fly four times a week in winter season (28Oct06-24Mar07)on Mondays, Thursdays, Saturdays and Sundays from London Heathrow Airport, and operate extra flight on Tuesday in summer season(25Mar07-27Oct07). "

China Eastern flies to London with a Airbus A340-300, First Class (12 seats), Business Class (28 seats), Economy Class (247 seats) .
Seats in Economy have no Personal TV, but they have the traditional screen.Acording to Skytrax Airline Rating, China Eastern is a 2 star airline.
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/01102...
http://www.airliners.net/open.file/01114...
Some passengers comments (Skytrax):
"I thought that for the money this wasn't too bad an experience. Surprised how much of the meals I ate (even though they were basically all similar - ie either 'Pork rice or beef noodle' or vice versa). "

"FAs exceptionally attentive with quite acceptable English skills. Dinners were 3 courses with choice of 3 entree dishes. All excellent Chinese style dishes. Breakfast choice of western or oriental - or both! Alcohol lavishly served with meals; water/juice/refreshment towels regularly served throughout all flights. "
http://www.airlinequality.com/forum/c_ea...

Others
Should it not read, "I've heard some pretty terrible reviews so I'm NOT flying China Eastern?
MU551 ShanghaiPudong [1330] London [1850]
every mon, tue, thurs, sat, sun
It is pretty dire. I know people who have used it, they all say never again. The gullible are lured into booking the tickets as they're dirt cheap.
These are all true stories told to me by friends:
On one internal flight they had overbooked so they put CAMPING STOOLS in the aisle.
On a flight from Shanghai to London, they only had enough food for half the passengers.
There is no inflight entertainment.
The seat pitch is one of the smallest of any airline.
The FA's are rude, and most only speak Cantonese, even on international flights.
They're never on time, connections get missed.
For further horror stories I suggest you look at the airline quality website (I can't put the link as this is a violation), it has view from passengers on airlines and airports.
The flight is about 12 hours.
Flying time on China Eastern Shanghai to London is 12hrs 20mins

Inflight service is pretty average, nothing special. The only big problem that received crappy review and the most complaints with negative publicity in China, is mainly domestic route. Haven't heard any awful ones internationally.

The only unfortunate thing may happening is if their plane broke down for mechanical reason, since they only have 5 A340-300 and 5 -600 models. The 340 are in their maximum utilization so if 1 broke down it can be a headache.
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