This is a Trip Report from the Premium Economy cabin
Ground Staff
Food & Drink
Entertainment
Seat
Cabin Crew
Aircraft Reg: G-VROC
Trip Report: Covert Surveillance
Surveiilance commences. Sunday 2nd March 2008. Subject was observed arriving outside Heathrow terminal 3 at 0830. Went straight to Virgin Atlantic Upper Class desks. No queue, dealt with immediately, allowed to take two bags with him and directed to private lift. Subject passed immediately through private security and used stamped boarding card to allow avoidance of secondary shoe screening. Subject visited Borders bookshop in main departure area. Purchased one book - trashy crime novel.
Progressed from there directly to the Virgin Clubhouse, dropped a bag in the cloakroom and settled in the lounge area, lower level to the right upon entrance. Extracted laptop and connected to mains and wireless. Subject was also noted trying to get attention from waiting staff, which took at least ten minutes. Subject noted becoming visibly irritated by lack of service.
0910, subject approached Concierge Desk, but after waiting for other passengers to be dealt with for a few minutes moved away towards the Cowshed Spa for what was obviously an appointment at 0915. Target lost upon entry to treatment room. Surveillance suspended. NOTE: Arrange interrogation of Cowshed therapist to ascertain loyalties.
Surveillance recommenced 0940. Subject left treatment room with clearly moisturised and glowing face (Deduction: treatment was facial) and returned to Concierge. Exchange with staff member there appeared to be regarding using miles to upgrade to Upper Class. Subject left disappointed as last upgrade for the flight had just been actioned. Was heard to observe 'I knew I should have done it as soon as I got here.'
Returned to same seat vacated earlier and ordered Bellini and sausage sandwich. Further frustrated by lack of peach juice at bar. Selected option of glass of champagne instead. (Query - was Bellini codeword? Direct to Cryptography section.)
Subject left Clubhouse when flight called at 1020. Departure gate was Gate 7. Upon arriving, subject joined regular line, but then noting others from Clubhouse following the instruction to go to the front of the queue, followed suit. Was allowed to cut a loop of the queue and boarding card was checked with other priority passengers. (Observation - first time this watcher has seen this process work.)
On board, subject was directed to aisle seat with window seat passenger boarding immediately behind him. Window seat passenger emptied huge number of personal items from bag with the explanation that she didn't want to keep disturbing subject, and settled in. Subject removed book, newspaper and iPod from own bag and accepted the offer of 'sparkly stuff' from crew member.
Subject appeared relaxed and comfortable during flight, and appeared to find the service as expected. Crew distributed menus, headsets and drinks, and in-flight entertainment was switched on. Subject was only observed to use IFE to play Sudoku. Commented (wearily) to neighbour that he'd seen everything he wanted to of the film and TV options on the very many flights he'd taken recently.
Subject was observed to select the beef stew from the lunch options, and appeared to enjoy it. He and his neighbour exchanged almost their only other comments over the brandy and Baileys offered after the meal. Immediately after, it became necessary to vacate his seat while a crew member attended to the neighbouring IFE, which had defaulted to the Japanese settings.
Subject slept fitfully for a few hours in the middle of the flight, eventually roused by the loud crackling of heated wraps being delivered and opened around him. Subsequently he read and played more Sudoku until afternoon tea service, when hot drinks were not available due to the in-flight water supply having run out. Substitution of apple juice took place.
Flight arrived in San Francisco on schedule, and subject departed aircraft among first of Premium Economy Passengers. Cathay Pacific passengers in Immigration Hall created delays for all Virgin passengers. Transit of immigration (including new ten finger fingerprinting) took twenty minutes in total. Subject passed directly through Customs, where extended scanning and searching was in force for significant proportion of passengers. Subject was not included in this extended review and went directly to taxi rank.
Boarded taxi at 1440 local. Surveillance ends.
