Triangle Trip

There are nine (9) terminals in Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) – Terminals 1 to 9 and Tom Bradley International Terminal (TBIT). Not all LAX terminals have airside connections (i.e., you will need to go through security from TBIT to Terminal 1).

The American Express Centurion Lounge at Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) is located in Tom Bradley International Terminal (TBIT), which is the main terminal with many international airlines. TBIT has also been recently expanded to include a set of West Gates. The AMEX Centurion Lounge is located on the south side of the TBIT right after TSA Pre-Check. For those who do not have TSA Pre, Clear is also located at the same checkpoint. If you do not have TSA Pre, you will need to go through security at the other end of TBIT.

If you are departing from Terminals 4, 5, 6, 7, or 8 and want to access the American Express Centurion Lounge before your flight, we recommend you go through security at TBIT. Below is a chart of estimated walk times to get to your terminals and gates. Allocate more time if you are traveling with children or a slow walker as there are escalators (more walking if they are out of service) that connects these terminals.

The Tom Bradley Terminal (TBIT) is NOT connected to Terminals 1, 2, and 3. This means you will need to go through security at TBIT to access the Amex lounge and go through security at your terminal again for your flights going out of Terminals 1, 2, and 3. As of 2022, LAX Terminal 1 is mostly Southwest flights and Terminals 2 and 3 are Delta flights and its codeshare partners like Virgin. If you’re an American Express Platinum member, you can go to the Delta lounges as an alternative.

Follow up to my previous post about United’s international WiFi offering, I’d the chance to take advantage of United’s international WiFi service on United flight 180 from Hong Kong to Newark. I’ve been doing the EWR-HKG route since my previous post but none of those flights had a working electricity outlet which prevented me from forking over US$17 for 3 hours of internet service. On this flight, the electricity outlet on my seat is working which means I’ll have about 10 hours of internet connection for $17.

Soon after leaving Chinese air space where there is no satellite coverage, I was able to login to United WiFi using my United MileagePlus credentials. The signup process was extremely smooth as my credit card on file was shown and all I had to do was to check off the terms and conditions box and the purchase button.

The next thing I did was to test if I could use my paid subscription across multiple devices. The answer is YES. I was able to login to my Mac and iPhone BUT not at the same time. Each United MileagePlus account can only pay for one United WiFi subscription. You can however switch devices using your MileagePlus account as the login.

The second thing I did was to run a speedtest to check the connection speed. Below is the result flying over Japan:

As you can see from the connection speed results, do not expect to use United’s international WiFi connection to do anything beyond checking emails, browsing basic sites such as reading news, and writing this post 😉

For the record, I’ve tried the following services:

• FaceTime which timed out.
• Skype call which worked but the voice quality was unbearable.
• Websites with rich content (video and text) such as ESPN.com took about 30 seconds to load.

In summary, I think the $17 for approximately 10 hours (losing 3 hours flying out of China air space and about 2 hours to get above certain altitude to receive WiFi) is worth it.

Delta introduced two major changes to the 2010 SkyMiles program: 1) Rollover Medallion Qualifying Miles (Rollover MQM) which lets you build status toward the following year; and 2) a new Medallion class: Diamond which requires you to have 125,000 MQM. We are extremely pleased to see this change as it is definitely ground breaking for the airline industry.

I have been traveling coast to coast on United and Delta for the past six months. The Rollover MQM along with the free/complementary upgrades clearly made Delta my carrier of choice for the rest of the year (see previous post regarding Delta as the best for coast to coast travel). I would be surprised if United or American follows this promotion as they have most of the corporate customers locked into corporate travel plans/accounts such as 25 to 30% discount plan.

Marriott launched their Elite Rollover Nights program in late spring and none of the major hotel chains followed. Marriott’s move to offer Elite Rollover Nights doesn’t surprise me since they require 75 actual nights to obtain Platinum status which means Elite rollover doesn’t begin until your 76th night. With 50 to 60 nights at other hotels like SPG, Hilton respectively, you’d be at their highest level.

Delta is extremely generous with its rollover plan. You can practically begin rolling over miles after making silver – or your 25,001st medallion mile. For example, if you earned 45 MQMs this year – 20,000 MQM more than the Silver Medallion requirement – the 20,000 MQMs will automatically roll over to next year’s balance. This means for 2010, you will only need to get 5,000 MQM to get Silver Medallion. This is actually a great perk as Delta didn’t devalue its mileage program with the Double/Triple MQM scam (see previous post) – I only earned 1 double MQM from all my trips.

Captain G will go on record to endorse Delta despite the fact that Delta JFK’s customer service should all be overhauled (see previous post).