Aircraft you hated flying in
 

The DC4 was grim. It was for a school expedition, about 1973, I think. From JNB to WDH in (what was still) South West Africa. It became clear that a group from another school took the bus (it was NOT a coach!) finishing their 9 day trip at Windhoek airport. The old crate took us out - we swapped over - and then the bus did the tour and back. There were some good things about the trip but ALL the transport was grim!

Somewher I have a photograph.

A BN Islander or Trilander(?) from Antigua to Barbuda and return. Revenue flight, but a charter. As you can imagine it was LOUD LOUD LOUD! and also a bit long in the tooth. I've tolerated most aircraft, perhaps helped by being interested in aviation and haven't 'hated' any aircraft. It's more the other passengers or a tech issue causing delays or weather making the flight uncomfortable/dangerous. A flight on a BA777 with half my footpace taken by a large metal box for the in-flight entertainment. 10hrs of discomfort and no sympathy from either BA or the crew.

I had the IFE under the seat in front experience and think that was on the older triple 7 200s I have only flown on 300s lately so not sure if that problems still there. i wouldnt say i hate it but I dont like the triple much , sort of wallows through the air and the engines constantly hunting up and don to maintain whatever s been put in the auto pilot, DC10 wasn't a favourite either. Have to judge them for their time of course behind the wing on non fan 707s was pretty unpleasant but not that different than early jets as a whole

Any modern 737. The cabin feels tiny, they have put far too many seats in them and as a result they are very cramped - i'm 5"10', not a giant (and not that fat). A320 is a breath of fresh air in comparison, even ones where they have shoved as many rows in as they could get away with!

It was on that fleet that were based at LGW, I seem to remember they were inherited in a purchase. Whoever thought that the under the seat in front real estate heist was obviously never a passenger flying long distances. As you say, we need to judge aircraft for their time and not compared with contemporary offerings.

Piedmont Airlines flew the Nihon YS-11, which was a Japanese designed aircraft. The seating was sized for the average Japanese, not American.

Worst ever flight a BEA vanguard from GIB to LGW, felt like it took days.

Another vote for the 777, how I dislike that aeroplane but so often seem to be inflicted with it. Next year LHR-MLE, can just about cope with PE, can't afford Club these days!

Amen.
I love paying for a window seat and no window.
Eternal hell and damnation for the intern that came up with that idea.

https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....fec29039d.jpeg

There is very reasonable reason for that - it's necessary to pass air from the packs to the overhead area for distribution through the cabin.
It's certainly not exclusive to the 737 - nearly every pressurized passenger aircraft out there has a few rows where there is no window due to the requirement to send conditioned air to the overhead.

The Tupolev Tu-114. Gods it was noisy, if you wanted to communicate with the cabin crew you had to write them a little note. I didn't fly in one that often (I think twice) but I think my hearing loss started then.

Another vote for the 777. I will go out of my way to avoid it: earlier/later flights, different routes - anything to not have to fly that uncomfortably loud and wallowing aircraft.
The others I can forgive for being old - and as they are old have their own charms.

You’re an engineer aren’t you?

*Concocting evil spells*

Though its successor, the Tu-134, was distinguished by having a skylight in the toilet. :O

DC-9 - cramped, noisy uncomfortable

L1011. Every one I flew on had a strange vibration that I never felt on DC10, 747, etc.

Up until August 2025 I didn't have any aircraft that I hated to fly aboard.......that was until I experienced 4 flights in 24 hours aboard an ATR. OMG. Maybe due to being given a seat that was stuck in the tail section, I don't know, but they are absolutely awful. It was like travelling down a road in a Mini, without suspension, finding every single crack and pothole in existance and thudding and bouncing in all of them. I am not a nervous flyer by any means but the ATR certainly managed to rattle me a bit. Definitely no likey the ATR...at all.

SAS A330. Those don’t have indivividual air outlets for pax as most A330 do. Cabin was full, the air was still and hot. I felt I would choke before we’d arrive to the destination. Never again.

Fairchild Metro. Very claustrophobic, especially with full pax. I'd sooner fly in an An2 if there was no rush.

It wasn't nicknamed "the San Antonio sewer-pipe" for nothing. :O

Likewise, I really don't like the B737 - and I had the misfortune to be type rated on the Classic and flew them.

Small, cramped, basic, and very old. The systems are limited and archaic, the automatics are only partially automatic, the cockpit is very cramped, and terrible. They are laid out for a Captain and a secretary, rather than two fully qualified pilots. Do the main doors still have the loose girt bar that has to be manually placed into clips to arm the door ?

The A320 family: the cockpit, instruments and layout, aircraft, automatics, systems etc are an order of magnitude better.

Someone mentioned the ATR. From a technical point of view; a nice aircraft, but from a passenger point of view: if you had to get out of one in a hurry, I can't see how it would be possible - you would even be hard pressed to climb over the top of the seats there is so little space. Shudder...........

Again from a pilot's point of view: all aircraft with only a tiller on the Captain's side. Why ?? If you trust a first officer to land at 130kts at night in turbulence and crosswind, and take over, descend and land solo if the Captain becomes incapacitated; why don't you trust them to taxy along the ground very slowly following a painted line or line of green lights ?

Because of this stupid policy, the very first commercial aircraft I taxied onto stand, was an A330 - a very large and heavy aircraft for your first time threading that needle.

Last year on Aerlingus regional ATR…WOULD RATHER TAKE THE FERRY ACROSS IN A GALE.

Bandeirante, noisy and drafty sitting at the back.

I didn't have any type I actively disliked until I experienced a BA 787 overnight transatlantic eastbound. I suppose it started with being told by the office travel organiser that they had, with such professional expertise, got me in an exit row seat. The first thing that struck me as I walked down through the PE cabin to the division was how much narrower the regular Y seats were than even PE. Then, if you think about it, the sort of people who try hard to go for these seats are those of greater stature, and I'm on the window, seatmate in the middle turns out to be 6'6". The exit row seats don't have drop down trays or screens in front but they come out of the armrest, which are thus thicker and so reduce the seat width even more, and with all this hardware inside is fixed. In a way fortunate because seatmate tries to lift it, presumably to impinge on my space even more but can't. Meanwhile, on the other side the size of the door surround means it's a window seat without a window, but also this curves inwards right into my space on that side such that you can't even sit upright, have to be squashed at an angle. Good start to a 4,000 mile overnighter. I bet Boeing never showed the inward curvature of the door surround on the cabin seat charts.

Worst aircraft I ever flew on was a CN-235 from Jakarta to Bandung. Designed by CASA, built under license by IPTN in Indonesia - basically a small twin engine military cargo aircraft, crudely converted for civilian use.
Horrible, horrible aircraft - maybe the only time I've been actually scared while flying. Not nervous - scared!!! The only redeeming feature was that it was a short flight...

BTW WHBM - you do know that Boeing isn't responsible for the interior layout - that's done purely by the operator. It's not a 787 issue, it's an issue with the interior layout that BA elected to use to cram in as many seats as possible.

Completely agree bp - my last year with wastospace was spent at 'sunny' Warton - we flew up from Farnborough monday morning on a company a/c, we were handing over the Harriers after the Dunsfold closure.
If we were lucky we got a company 146,if not quite so lucky we got a Skoda (ATP/80p) - if we were really unlucky we got a hired in ATR from Titan.
I hated the ATR :eek: -
Most of 'the lads' loved the ATR though because it invariably had very young and attractive Hosties on board :).
It was a good deal while it lasted - up on monday morning - back home thursday night,guaranteed overtime payment - but eventually I took the money and ran back to a nicer part of the country :)

My wife tore her ACL trying to get into one of those seats. No sympathy from Aerlingus.

That's easy, the A330-200 and A330-300, bloody hate them. The B767 was a far nicer. My fav was by far the B757

Thank you TD, though I do have something of an awareness of carrier's cabin fitout procurement that maybe slightly exceeds the tabloid press. I'm also aware of manufacturers 'typical' cabin layouts, of their keenness to quote minimal seat-mile costs which thus depend on maximum seating, and would be pretty sure this layout was in the original design drawing suggestions for the 787 Y cabin, and is replicated by most carriers. Given that seats themselves have to be certificated there is only a limited range for carriers to choose from. I can imagine that other carriers will do the same, for if you are going to do 3-3-3 in the first cabin row there's little else in a 787 that could be done.

Hated flying on the Lockheed L-188 Electra. The props never seemed to be synched and there was always a harmonic vibration that went from annoying to uncomfortable. By comparison, the Vickers Viscount was a bed of roses, and I loved flying on the Boeing 727, even in the rear near the engines.

Before and during the Balkan Wars I was working in that part of the World and did a fair amount of flying on ex Soviet equipment. Aircraft with nicotine dripping off roof fittings and missing seatbelts were not uncommon!

I'm not sure if I disliked it, was terrified by it or treated it as a scary fairground ride but the An 2 took the biscuit. I had over 20 flights in it - mostly charter - ang got to know the crews who were totally mad flying into impossible little strips and under cloud through the mountains. On one occasion the co-pilot didn't turn up (probably drunk) and the captain asked if I would sit in the right hand seat! Always an experience.

Interesting aircraft to maintain and fly in. It could be a bumpy ride at low level in equatorial African conditions. I read in the manual that the recommended technique for landing after an engine failure at night or in bad weather conditions was to pull the yoke fully aft and let the flaps and leading edge slats take care of the rest.

Glad that a few people share my dislike of the Triple , but another post reminded me what an awful experience KHR to KL on a BA787 was, my first and I hope last trip on one. Club was awful , ridiculous narrow seat and i am not very big and the assorted recline positions were awkward and uncomfortable -a huge disappointment . Of course the airline makes a difference but the 78 seems to be a 767 semi widebody without the good bits of the old 76 . A300 at least in business is much nice. I ahvent yet flows an an A350 but nowadays nothign can touch the 380 and I have to say J class n Qatar airways 380 was excllent in every respect

In 1997 LHR to JFK and return a week later on a tired, aging Kuwait Airways 747, there and back on the same aircraft, in the same economy bulkhead-facing seats, with the same broken armrest media centre both ways. We hadn't appreciated that crew rest seats were in the bulkhead facing us so overnight on the way back we had a series of dozing cabin crew opposite, no entertainment and, because it was a 'dry' airline, no soothing drink to aid sleep. In the less than comfortable centre seat I didn't sleep at all and was a very grumpy soul on arrival. A memorably dreadful flight.

The 767 was designed for 7 abreast seating - provision for 8. The 777 was designed for 9 abreast seating - provisioned for 10, and the 787 was designed for 8 abreast, provisioned for 9.
Sadly, with the average customer putting price well above value when buying tickets, in order to minimize ticket prices most operators have gone to 10 abreast in the 777 and 9 abreast in the 787. One reason why the 767 was a passenger favorite was that very few aircraft were fitted with the 8 abreast in coach (long ago, I flew a flight test on a 767 with 8 abreast in coach - I could barely fit in the seat and I'm far from a large person (and I weighed about 50 pounds less then than I do now) - it was horrid).
Eight abreast on a 787 is just fine - as is nine on a 777 - sadly few airlines actually do that unless you spring for 'premium' economy...

Kuwait Airways is still dry. It has prime-time tv advertising but still has poor loading factors because people would rather have a drink on board than support their national airline.

We'd asked the travel agent for the cheapest flight to JFK and knew Kuwait would be dry but really regretted deciding to go 'cheap' on that dreadful return journey.

This is one I mentioned when starting this thread. By the time I went on this, I was fairly well travelled and knew this was a cheap old crate. Naturally it was reliable but zero fun.

I scanned this from a very old photo that I took as we walked out to it on the apron at JNB in March 1972, going to WDH.

https://cimg9.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....56c9cd17e6.jpg

B787, hate the bloody things, imo, too small for long haul. Flew in a T-154M once, on internal flight in China. that was interesting.

Agreed. Flew B787 non-stop Oz-UK. Not pleasant. A380 return. Chalk & cheese.

Swaziland! So, when I went to live there, in '75 with my parents, we arrived in JNB, and I remember a small ac flying us to what was at the time, the main airport Matsapha. I don't remember what type of ac it was though.