Summary
- A Delta Airlines pilot retires after 30 years, chartering his own A330neo to Hawaii for his family and friends to enjoy.
- Retirement flights are traditionally marked with water salutes, speeches, or wing waves.
On February 28, a Delta Air Lines captain, Cpt Rosenkranz, retired after working for the carrier since 1991.
Any pilot retiring gets to have fun and produce their family along. This captain took this to the following level and chartered an A330neo for his family and friends to enjoy. As shared by @airlinevideos on X, formerly Twitter, the aircraft itself was a reasonably special selection.
The A330neo used for the flight was N411DX, a two-year-old A330-900 delivered recent to Delta. This aircraft is exclusive because it wears the “Team USA” livery and was chartered by the USA Olympic team in the course of the 2021 Tokyo Olympics.
In response to the aviation blog Paddle Your Own Kanoo, the pilot also invited other pilots along on the flight, particularly those that had retired in the course of the pandemic and thus couldn’t organize their very own retirement flights.
In response to Flightradar24, N411DX flew from Los Angeles (LAX) to Kailua-Kona (KOA) as DL8871. That is not a daily Delta flight, or a daily flight number, but one reserved for special flights reminiscent of this charter operation.
The aircraft took off from LAX on February 27 at just after 11:00. The five-and-a-bit-hour trip to Kona saw it arriving at around 14:30, however it wasn’t to stop on the paradise island for long. The following day, it departed Kona at 09:00, arriving back at LAX at around 15:30.
![Screenshot 2024-02-29 at 16.52.32](https://static1.simpleflyingimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/screenshot-2024-02-29-at-16-52-32.png)
![Screenshot 2024-02-29 at 16.52.55](https://static1.simpleflyingimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/screenshot-2024-02-29-at-16-52-55.png)
Delta’s charter operations
Delta does allow the chartering of its aircraft for personal flights; indeed, it has a raft of aircraft available to charter, from the 109-passenger Airbus A220-100 as much as the behemoth Boeing 767-400ER. However the A330-900 trumps even that, with a passenger capability of 281, in comparison with the -400ERs 238.
The flight will need to have been a spacious and comfy affair, on condition that only around 100 people were considered onboard. Delta doesn’t publish its prices for chartering aircraft, but a flight using the A330neo would not come low cost… perhaps Captain Rosenkranz got a ‘staff discount,’ and he definitely saved on the fee of hiring flight crew!
![A Delta Air Lines Airbus A220](https://static1.simpleflyingimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/shutterstock_2228950643.jpeg)
5 US Airlines That Let You Charter Their Aircraft For Private Flights
A take a look at five major US airlines that organize private charters.
Retirement flights: a cause for celebration
Chartering a long-haul widebody aircraft will not be exactly a standard method to have fun the top of a piloting profession. Still, the industry does have a convention of marking those special occasions for pilots. Essentially the most typical method to mark the occasion is water salutes. These are also sometimes used when an airline retires an aircraft type and when a brand new route is inaugurated.
![Water-canon-salutes](https://static1.simpleflyingimages.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/GettyImages-130387120-scaled.jpg)
Why Do Some Flights Get Water Cannon Salutes?
That is what it looks like from the cockpit; it’s an emotional moment for the pilot, his family, and his friends.
Other creative ways of marking the occasion are wing waves, reminiscent of the one performed recently by a retiring pilot by waving the wings side to side upon departure – a way of bidding farewell and thanking the staff on the bottom. They are sometimes performed on delivery flights.
Retirement flights allow pilots to look back at their careers and have fun with family members. Whether with water salutes or by letting the captain rent out the jet, airlines are accommodating in allowing their dedicated flight crews to have fun of their favorite way.
Have you ever witnessed a retirement flight, or have you ever been on one? How was it? Tell us within the comments below.