V-Flyer

Hi

On Monday we despatch offspring #2, aka The Less Favoured One, off to the USA to spend a semester at the University of Knoxville in TN. She's flying on a single PNR with Continental from LHR to TYS via EWR, with a lengthy layover (7 hours!). Just so her mother doesn't worry (honest, I'm completely relaxed about the whole thing... ) can anyone help enlighten us about the process at EWR.

I assume she'll have to transit immigration and customs @ EWR. Once she has her hold luggage and is through customs, will she need to trek with it to find the Continental check in for her next, domestic, flight (which departs from Terminal A, I think) and so effectively have to keep it with her until the check in for that flight opens?

Finally, how will she get from Terminal B to Terminal A at EWR?

Any help and guidance gratefully received..

Thanks

Paul

EWR is dead easy-peasy to transfer. I did it myself in the summer with no problem.

Yes, she goes through immigration, collects her bags and goes through customs. I'm assuming that she is in the international terminal. On the way to the exit and just before the main doors there is a glassed-in area on the left with CO staff there. If she already doesn't have her boarding card for her onward flight, they will check her in and take her to the bag drop with is just a little way further along from that check-in area. From there they will direct her to the AirTran which will take her to the relevant terminal.

There are plenty of staff there to ask and I found them all most helpful.

I like EWR

Edited to add: I had a long wait between flights at EWR and it wasn't a problem dropping off the bags on my arrival there just as soon as I had exited customs and immigration. She will have them in her possession for roughly about 10-15mins from the time it takes to exit customs to the drop-off point

When she is re-checking her bags after clearing customs it won't hurt to ask if they can move her to an earlier flight (unless other arrangements preclude that). They can only say no but in general I think US airlines are more ameniable to doing this than UK ones (once had a bad experience with BA at EDI whos sticking to the rules rather than using common sense was staggering)

Sorry, pjh but just to clarify something in my response. When I said

On the way to the exit and just before the main doors there is a glassed-in area on the left

what I meant was on the way out to the exit of the security area She doesn't have to leave that at all. The last paragraph of this trip report might help.

Thanks both HL and Tonty. Hopefully all will go smoothly anyway; she is 20, after all, and with a sensible head on her shoulders but it'll be her first solo long haul flight, and I just wanted to draw on the experiences here to tell her what to look out for. On the advice of the agent when we booked she is in no hurry, and given the experiences in HL's TR it seems that we were wise to take the advice.

Tonty - I mentioned about asking about an earlier flight but it turns out the next available after she lands at EWR requires a further connection in Charlotte or somewhere similar...

Thanks again

Paul

Charlotte would be easy to transfer in also. She would probably arrive in, say, Gate 6 and leave from Gate 8 but the probability would be that she might not arrive that much earlier although the bags would be through checked.

The A terminal in EWR, when she has gone through security which is a long corridor she will arrive at the gate area which is circular and with sufficient outlets to get coffee or something to eat. Other than that, it is rather boring.

I transferred at Charlotte last summer (LGA on the way to Fayetteville Arkansas) and it was very easy. I was with US Airways and it was all within the same terminal. I can't remember what gates I changed from and too, but as HL alludes to, it wasn't far.

Airlines using a given airport as a hub (like CO w/Newark) will normally have bag drop facilities right outside the customs exit area. This tends to make things a lot easier than one might imagine. On a good day I would think HL's 15 minutes at EWR could be easily beaten.

In some cases (LAX for example) you have airlines paying to set up a customs facility in their own terminal area, so that some of them avoid the international terminal areas completely (a very good thing at LAX).

MarkedMan wrote: On a good day I would think HL's 15 minutes at EWR could be easily beaten.

Oh, it definitely could, but I was allowing "dithering time" where someone stood looking where to go and perhaps looking around for someone to ask

A thanks to all for the advice; it was very reassuring to be able to pass on the information. V-F, as they say, rocks. Apparently the transfer worked well, with only 10 mins to get through immigration, but she couldn't get any earlier flight as there was already an extensive wait list, so the time at EWR dragged a wee bit. We've just been on Skype with her (as she is, at the same time, engaged in an instant messaging session with her boyfriend) and she sounds a bit tired; she's off to Walmart soon to buy some bedding and other supplies!

Paul

Glad she got there safe and well (if tired) shame about not being able to get on the earlier flight though.

Glad the transfer went well. I had been wondering if it had been OK if a bit boring (I did warn you ): )