has anyone flow with airtran recently? are their planes decent, are they usually pretty ontime with flights? we are looking at them for our trip in March, flying from MSP to MIA. . it will be about $1000 less for 6 of us then booking with like northwest which we usually fly. any advice let me know. Thanks

I flew Airtran back in early June from Orlando to Milwaukee. They were fine. New planes and most have XM Music. They even offered a free earphone. Don't expect any food on the flight, just a beverage. They use a lot of the Boeing, 717's, which are 2-3 configuration, but much newer than American Airlines Super 80's.

I flew AirTran some months agao from HPN White Plains NY to PBI West Palm Beach FL. The flight of 2hr 45min was pleasant, and unremarkable. There was only a beverage service, not a meal service. If going that way again, I'd certainly consider flying AirTran again.

I've used AirTran CAK-BOS a few times. Everything was fine and CAK is a breeze.

OK thanks for the replies guys. . I'm planning on going that way then as long as they offer the flights we need as they haven't published them yet for mid march.. but i'm checking everyday. Thanks again!!

Plane and service were fine. We had a problem involving their computer system (others have reported similar issues) where there was something sitting in our seats when we got on the plane - and we each had valid boarding passes for those seats.

What was positive about even that experience was they found us seats on the full plane by offering money to others to get off - and it was end of school vacation week so we feared we were in trouble.

We've used them quite often in the last year or so. Newer planes, efficient service, polite staff. A good experience.

The only thing we noticed is that they usually begin boarding the plane about 40 minutes before the flight time. Every time we've flown with them, they push away from the gate 3 to 5 minutes early. Do not be late or you will be left behind!

The recent survery in Consumer Reports ranks Airtran below most smaller and newer airlines. ATA was the only one ranked lower.

Keith

Consumer Reports gets more and more clueless the further they get from cars and appliances.