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British Airways Deny Rumors – Flights to Kuwait Will Not Stop

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On Friday Al Arabia published an article stating that the British Airways had given the Kuwait Authorities a warning to fix the security lapses at the Kuwait Airport or risk having all BA flights to Kuwait canceled. According to one of my sources close to British Airways, BA are denying this story, no warning was given to local authorities and no flights to Kuwait will be stopping.

Since we’re on the subject of British Airways, last month they finally announced that they will be refurbishing their aging Boeing 747’s which currently operate on the Kuwait – London – Kuwait route. The current planes are in pretty poor condition with an outdated entertainment system while lacking amenities like USB ports to charge your devices. Does anyone know if Kuwait Airways are operating their new planes on the London route? If they are they might be a good alternative until BA finally upgrade the planes.

35 replies on “British Airways Deny Rumors – Flights to Kuwait Will Not Stop”

When we booked we were told that the new planes will be operational in september but not everyday and only on certain routes; London is one of them. We booked on the days where we fly in and out on them!
Can’t wait!

The new aircraft is Airbus 330 where as previously they used Boeing aircraft! And yes you can see the aircraft type while booking.

I can’t say that I can tell. But the Kuwait Airways travel agents know and the guy we were talking to told us something like they fly in/out every other day back and forth from LHR.

During Sept the schedule of the new aircraft is London is very haphazard coz of the Eid holidays.
from october onwards every wednesday, friday & sunday they will operating the new aircraft to London.

It’s also based on sources to Alrai. Kuwait Times also brought this news and they are major news sources.
It seems to me to be real… Even if it won’t happen… At least something was said about it.

Whatever the case – and let me state off the bat that I’m glad this turned out to be nothing more than baseless talk – this is an extremely embarrassing subject to be brought up and it really exposes the joke the Kuwait International Airport has become.

The truth is, our security really doesn’t come off as anything reassuring from layout to execution. I can’t think of any other airport where you need to go through a metal detector when you enter the check-in zones, another one to enter passport control and yet another one to access the gates… But despite this obscenely redundant repetition, each security post is manned by guards who are too busy playing with their phones, talking to their colleagues, walking around and singling out ‘suspicious’ looking folk [read: Indians, Egyptians and other expats they can get a rise out of] to exercise their power trips. I’ve been through machines several times and a belt I’d be wearing or phone I forgot to remove from my pocket would trigger the beeper, yet no guard would even bat a lash.

Most airports have one major, all-encompassing security checkpoint that all passengers pass through and that’s it. We’ve got several – which is useless in and of itself – and they’re hilariously manned. I genuinely don’t doubt or blame the origin of the rumors, but to see something like this reach international levels is a major blemish on Kuwait’s reputation.

I hope something is done. This is a dark and scary age and it’s honestly a miracle things have been safe on the air front for so long, but this really needs to be stepped up.

Kuwait airport becoming a joke?
blemish of Kuwait reputation?

The issue is with security. Kuwait Airport has nothing to do with it. Security is simple, you have the man power, order them to do their job. If you have poor management at the top of course you’re going to have poor people in the field. I once saw a european lady about to board BA flight from Kuwait… she passed the final metal detector and the machine beeped. The officer instructed her to go to the women inspection area and she tried to talk her way out of it. It was a really weird incident. I’m willing to bet she was testing the local security staff and I wouldn’t be surprised if indeed there is a warning about stopping BA flights from BA.

Yes BA is going downhill. I thought it was just because of this London-Kuwait-London route but turns out this is becoming the norm.

BA was perfect. Then all of a sudden the flight attendants were replaced with very VERY old people. Like people past the retirement age. Still very friendly and professional… but kept me wondering about their ability to handle emergency situation. Then this happened… young flight attendants show up but their quality is really really poor and extremely rude.

It is like BA started to hire those who were kicked out of other airlines and paying them minimum wage! What a shame.

I just flew BA to the States this year because I got this incredibly good price, but I flew BA out of Dubai to London because the flight attendants treat you much better out of Dubai than Kuwait. They really hate Kuwait and it is reflected in their service out of this airport – it is not fair to me as an expat that I suffer rudeness because they hate Kuwait, I hate Kuwait Airport and avoid it by flying out FLYDUBAI. It was also reported that you will build a prefab airport in one and half years, are you joking? My flight out of Dubai was really nice, the service was nice and the flight attendants were very attentive, because see they are competing with Emirates on that route so they try to up-the-bar although they are stuck with the 747’s. I hate the seating on this plane and the exorbitant fee that you pay for your seat before flying is ridiculous, but many passengers now fly based on the type of planes and you see this out of A380 routes. Passengers will go out of their way to book those A380 flights and this plane is why Emirates Airlines has now been named one of the best airlines in the world and the choice for most travelers making Dubai Airport the busiest airport in the world over Heathrow now. In the end, all airlines are compared to GCC carriers now (Emirates, Etihad and Qatar Airways)because of their superior service levels and quality of aircraft. I do understand that BA does fly the A380 to Los Angeles out of LHR, but with increased A380 flights to London from Dubai and given the opportunity to carry on to US will kill BA business and they probably know that, but passengers all over the world are hoping for that route. Nothing is worse (oh wait, Kuwait Airways) than flying US carriers within the US, its HORRIBLE, truly third-world. I would put BA on par with American Airlines and United Airlines, in fact, they do co-share flights with them and they appear a bit better using BA flights. We are fortunate to have three superior carriers in the region to choose from on international flights and thank you FLYDUBAI for flying out of SZT so I can bypass the mess of Kuwait Airport!

Sorry but all arabic airlines kuwait airways,etihad,emirates,qatar airways have terrible baggage policy,hand bags only 7 kilos,checking bags 20-30 kilos and each extra bag 7-10 kd per kilo,thats why i never travel with aesbic airlines except of flydubai where u can buy excess baggage fir realy good price,for me when i travel is important baggage allowance,comfort of seats,quality of food and i prefer small airports,nothing else matters for me but i experienced a really bitchy stewardesses in KLM they like to take small handbags from business and first class passengers saying itis full there is no space for your bag when in the fact it is only you sitting there after all and of course things from your handbags are missing and locks broken ,insurance company pay you funny 500 £ for your things valued at thousands £ really never KLM for my family again!

I stopped reading your essay after you said that BA staff are rude because they hate Kuwait.

I flew with them from London to the US and back over the past few weeks. They had the same rude staff.

At least that confirms they are consistent with their service standard!

Well what happened is that BA started recruiting new staff on a much lower pay than earlier, but with the same job requirements , so as to reduce costs.Now all those working in BA are just working short term for the experience to jump off to another airline.

Actually, I don’t see anything wrong with British Airways. Yes, the KWI – LDN route isn’t the best, but surely you can see why? The passengers on the route, mostly Kuwaitis, have no respect towards the property. They treat the seats and equipments like shit. We’re quite an obnoxious breed, not all of though. I use BA regularly, as I study in England. I recently flew from London to New York in April via BA and London to Los Angeles in December. Both we’re tremendous. JFK was in economy and LA was in business. Great stewardess, spent a couple of hours on the LA trip speaking to a steward about football. Unlike Aziz, above says, they weren’t old. One or two were but the rest weren’t. My only issue with BA is that they don’t offer wifi on board. One of the most biggest things I’ve been impressed with BA is that you can actually lift the arm rest which is on the aisle. I once saw a fairly large guy who was having a hard time fitting into the economy seat then one of the stewards lifted the arm rest which faces the aisle and the guy had his leg sticking out for the duration of the flight! Not really useful for most people but it’s quite interesting as I’ve never seen any other airways do this.

Absolute bullshit.

I fly that route every two to three weeks and I can tell for a fact the flight is always full but rarely full of Kuwaiti passengers. Only during the holidays. Most of the times you have foreign passengers on stopover in Kuwait heading to the US.

Kuwaitis are respectful and very polite. I have never encountered any Kuwaiti that treated anything like shit.

I think you have some racial issue. Seek treatment.

I like BA they have the biggest handbag allowance 23 kilos i like how the seats are arranged in the plane i always choose my favourite seats they have very handy connective flights to other destinations,good duty free chioice of products on the plane and i dont care how flight attendants looks like neither how old they are,i travel with my beautiful wife so why would i look to other people as long as they serve me the food handle me some duty free shopping i dont care about nothing else about them
Only what i dont like is hassle at the Heathrow airport

“i travel with my beautiful wife so why would i look to other people as long as they serve me the food handle me some duty free shopping i dont care about nothing else about them”

I have witnessed a couple of incidents where BA flight attendants shined…

They’re always fighting with passengers over the overhead compartment. For **** sake, passengers paid for the seat and that should come with space above it. Why should a passenger struggle with his hand baggage so the flight attendant handbag occupy that space?!

Not so long ago I saw a flight attendant throwing a fit at one of the passengers (British) who placed her tiny backpack over his handbag. He was like “I HAVE AN IPAD, A VIDEO CAMERA, BLAH BLAH BLAH… YOU PROBABLY BROKE THEM NOW”!! That was the most childish thing. Just few weeks ago there was another flight attendant hissing and acting annoyed because he had to remove his hand bag from the space over one of the passengers seat! This happened more than half a dozen.

Not to mention they don’t try to ‘help’ they way they used to. For example I noticed many times some ladies or men struggling to put their handbags in the overhead compartment. OK I’ll understand if the handbag looked heavy… but if it didn’t look heavy then why the hell would you stand right behind that person and just look at them struggle?! Offer them a hand for f sake!

There is always one who is pissed of at another one of his/her colleagues. They’d sit in the back and complain and gossip and even cuss. Why should we get involved into that bad atmosphere?!

The list can go on forever.

I know they treat their first class staff to treat customers very well because customers paid a lot for their seats. But this is BA not EasyJet, FlyBe or Jet2… we did pay at least £650 for that uncomfortable economy seat. The least we deserve is a good treatment from their staff.

Khalid, I think you hit the nail on the head there. I loathe taking flights that are full of Kuwaitis as whilst there are sometimes some really good ones, those are usually outweighed by obnoxious ones with a strange sense of entitlement. It does not end there – those folk behave the same in other countries, forgetting that the boot is on the other foot….

Khalid and Si are mostly right. I take BA out of Kuwait and I blamed BA. The next time I took a connect to Dubai and did the trip to Manchester with BA and oh my God, I realized it wasn’t BA with the problem, it was the sector! Nice stewardess’, great baggage allowance, comfy seats!

I said mostly right because there are a few good Kuwaitis and I’m happy they’re around – can’t say the same for the majority I end up experiencing in the jamaiyas, on the road and at the Ministries

Cultural difference does not mean good or bad.

You may not like how people drive on the road in Kuwait… but at least when Kuwaitis see you crossing the road they will stop and let you cross. Here they won’t even bother to honk their horns to let you know you’re not supposed to cross the street… they’ll accelerate so the engine sound is your warning! That’s like saying “run for your life or i’ll hit you”. I’ve actually witnessed couple pedestrians getting hit by cars several times here in London.

As for the sector bit, yes I agree… BA is milking this sector dry. They know there is only one other airline flying direct flights in this route. So they abuse us with shit seats, strict baggage limits, and probably toss at us their worst flight attendants because they know we’ll pay to fly with them because we have no other option.

Amazing how a story on BA turns into yet another beat up on the Kuwaitis saga….. Yawn yawn.
James- you could always just leave- we won’t miss you.
#justsaying
BA staff have always been quite pleasant in my experience – the food however is not as good as it used to be and the inflight entertainment is quite poor.
So James- which utopia are you from anyway?

Kuwaitis traveling on BA are generally well behaved as they know they can’t get away with spoiled behavior like they do on Kuwait Airways

HOWEVER.. I’ve also witnessed several incidents in which drunk, entitled BRITS wrought absolute havoc on the BA flight from Kuwait and even on BA flights around Europe.

So stop generalizing!!!!

in all honesty they make it so easy to get drunk. on my flight back from LA the flight attendant kept refiling my champaign in the end i had to stop him cuz i realized a couple of more glasses and i would have been wasted. makes sleeping a lot easier though.

Each and every havoc I’ve witnessed on BA flights were by Brits, drunk or not… passengers or flight crew. From racial slur to just about everything else.

Seriously, the amount of disrespect to Kuwaitis in this post is sickening me.

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