The 737-400 we came in on last night was in very poor nick (decor wise) the cabin crew were very grumpy and as I had paid for Monarch standards just a little disappointing. Drinks service didn't start until one hour into the flight which was not the usual for Monarch
The plane was totally full and load / unload was not up to the usual standard as there just wasn't the handluggage space that there seems to be on a A321 lots of people had to have hand luggage transferred to the hold.
Not sure if there was really bad weather difficulties for the landing - which was of course safe- but was a real lengthy affair with lots of attitude and altitude adjustments on finals and one of the firmest "thumps" l can remember for years !
As rumoured the BHX-ABZ has changed to an Aberdeen based E175 four daily in the week with the Q400 operating at the weekend.
No other noticeable changes but the Q400's are not exactly worked hard with at times one could operate just two sectors.
Thomas Cook
Scorchio does the easyjet link-up have any impact on the BHX base such as more co-operation with Monarch? I know what you were told but it is approaching mid September and the summer 2013 schedule is still only showing two based.
I hope nothing has changed but if you were told mid August and four weeks later nothing has changed in the schedule other than Malta added is it a time to be concerned or just patient?
As for the schedulers, someone needs to get their act together, you have Thomas Cook selling Fuerteventura on a Saturday at the same time as the Monarch schedule flight and Thomson are selling it on a Wednesday on a Thomas Cook aircraft, which appears not to be in their schedule.
Having never flown with Monarch, this year I have finally got the opportunity to do so when booking my holiday I specifically chose them for our flight to Palma on 18th September. To my dismay I now know that we will be flying the infamous Air Explore 737. Thanks CVTDog for your thoughts
Flying with Monarch this Friday, made the booking on the strength of how I remember Monarch 10 years ago. Probably a mistake to do that A300, PE with brekky, hopefully won't be left with a sour taste. Transferred the flight booked from Brummy back up to MAN despite the extra cost, don't fancy "some random eastern european carrier".
Correct, that does free a Q400 making two out (ABZ/HAJ) and one in AMS.
The Hanover changes to 10.50 departure 15.25 arrival Monday - Friday and the only evening service is Sunday. It is a gamble though as the load factor with it operating in evening has been good even in the winter.
This is a rough idea of the revised and could be final based weekday schedule.
195 - 0700BHD1005 1500GLA1805 1845BHD2140
195 - 0700EDI1020 1445EDI1755 1835EDI2150
195 - 0630CDG1015 1210CDG1555 1715CDG2115
175 - 0700DUS1050 1355DUS1720 1750DUS2120
175 - 0650GLA1000 1305MXP1810 1840GLA2135
Q400 - 0650STR1145 1420AMS1735* 1800IOM2015
Q400 - 0705AMS1025 1050HAJ1525 1700 STR2200 (prime for a 175)
I flew back on Monday into BHX from FCO on Air Explore.
Naturally surprised that it wasn't a Monarch flight.
The aircraft is in a tired condition. I found the aircrew polite and efficient and kudos to Monarch to having a senior steward who was available to answer any questions.
Also sat next to Air Italy crew who are being transferred to Monarch duties.
That is very impressive, looks like BHX served as an alternative to the Olympic (London) airports, who all had a drop in Pax number (except for LGW's +0.3%).
Of the other large UK airports only ABZ had similar growth +9.1% and LBA +5.8%, growth also for BFS +5.1%, GLA +3.2%, NCL +2.2%, and only MAN +1.8% and BRS +0.5%.
'' looks like BHX served as an alternative to the Olympic (London) airports''...on what grounds can you base your assumption. It does not follow that increase in pax was as the result of Olympic arrivals/departures.
Misunderstanding - nearly 9% additional pax volume must have come from somewhere, the additional capacity this summer through the bmibaby/Monarch overlap and the increase in air fares to London during the Olympic period have driven business from North of LON to BHX.
So this is not Olympic traffic, but people displaced from the LON airports/choosing to avoid LON airports/Olympic traffic.
EDIT: BHX-ZRH now reduced to 14/7 for summer period 2013 too. Swiss European Avro replaces OLT F100 for the evening rotation.
Mini riot at luggage carousel in T2 on Friday 14th September after early arrival (22.45) of FR9162 Flight arrived 20 mins early and the T2 Border control was still open ( I think they close at 11pm). After 20 minutes and no sign of luggage a pax spotted a lone staff member and asked where the luggage was,and as a regular traveller said " perhaps gone to T1?" Staff member made a phone call and then vanished. Terminal now empty of staff (Border control left after checking last passport) with only the 150+ pax getting more and more frustrated. Angry pax trying to leave through Customs but being told they could not return for luggage,others on mobiles trying to get through to Airport management/taxis/relatives etc etc Pathetic announcements at 23.20 " luggage will be with you in 10 minutes" followed at 23.35 "luggage will be with you in 15 minutes" and even a lone staff member,accosted beyond Customs,saying there was a "problem with the belts". Eventually staff,including security,arrived and unfortunately were verbally abused by some angry pax (no excuse) and they said there was a delay getting the luggage back from T1 (handler problems) but it would be back soon. Luggage eventually arrived back at T2 at midnight, a full 80 mins after the flight arrival (some cynics may say this is normal for BHX) The only subsequent announcement was that the drop off car park fee would be capped at £1 for the FR Girona pax, which did not help those who missed the last trains and those that had to pay much extra for their waiting taxis. In retrospect one can understand what happened-the flight normally arrives after 23.00 and presumably both pax and luggage are transferred to T1. The appalling thing about all this is the apparent unawareness of management of what happened and why nobody took ownership of the problem and got it sorted pdq I think if pax had not kicked up a fuss then T2 arrivals would have been closed for the night,leaving the pax in limbo/no mans land until someone in T1 baggage wondered why nobody was collecting luggage off the Girona flight. It would be nice to know the true facts. Was the baggage put on carousels at T1 by the handlers? Did they then have to collect the baggage and reload them?Was the further delay due to them being allocated to another flight or what?
Had a similar experience at Edinburgh a few years ago when arriving from BFS.....1 hour wait for luggage. They sent the luggage to International arrivals and could not figure out why nobody was collecting it. They had to collect, restack and deliver to domestic arrivals.
Cant say too much on here but do find it amazing that regularly both in the departure lounge as well as the arrivals there are never any staff whatsoever. Do wonder about the security side of having 2-300 people basically unsupervised.I know there is cctv,but it doesnt really give a good impression of BHX, especially when things do go wrong..
Well here they are and in the main very good and perhaps some routes will never see such passenger figures again such as Rome and Nice. I can't say I monitored fares that much although what I paid for Venice was quite low for peak season but the longer Monarch routes seemed to be quite high and hopefully they made a bob or two.
CAA figures used for the passengers, the rest are estimated in some instances but with the aid of a BHX blog, libhomeradar and planespotters.net.
Some figures look amazing such as the increase in Cyprus routes but the net growth was nil due to the loss in charter passengers. Dalaman was the same but actually all Turkish routes in total were down except Istanbul.
Emirates recovered slightly (smaller decrease) and less than a third were on three class 77W's.
Prague's last full month for a while went out on a high with Lisbon not far behind.
I am not sure if Berlin is still in the honeymoon period but some outstanding figures although I realise some on here have said business is light.
I wonder if EI Regional will have scope to re-time Shannon next summer and squeeze in extra Knock flights,as that is one high load factor even if it was August (a mix of 66 & 72 seats used).
Some business routes such as Brussels and Copenhagen did see some seat reductions compared to last summer but other business routes did well for August such as Paris (AMS overflow?), DUS and FRA.
BRUSSELS...6691...(7921)...41 PAX...53%
LARNACA...8831...(5379)...192 PAX...97%
PAPHOS...4982...(3793)...192 PAX...95%
COPENHAGEN...5058...(5903)...70 PAX...75%
AVIGNON...1776...(1050)...52 PAX...65%
BERGERAC...1965...(1939)...58 PAX...70%
BREST...1319...(1749)...51 pax...66%
LA ROCHELLE...1351...(1458)...52 PAX...67%
MONTPELLIER...2870..(5664)...159 PAX...84%
NICE...13170...(7646)...116 pax...78%
PARIS...29315...(24683)...90... PAX...79%
PERPIGNAN...1194...(nil) 46 PAX/58%
BERLIN TXL...6575...(nil)...110 pax...79%
DUSSELDORF...13778...(12189)...51 PAX...58%
FRANKFURT...24514...(22973)...102 pax...66%
HAMBURG...5748...(2977)...40 pax...48%
HANOVER...5302...(5367)...53 pax...68%
MUNICH...14628...(13977)...86 pax...72%
STUTTGART...2667...(2642)...31 pax...40%
HERAKLION...3159...(nil)...176 pax...92%
CORK...7934...(7290)...53 pax...74%
DUBLIN...47657...(49918)...137 pax...75%
KNOCK...3793...(5797)...61 pax...92%
SHANNON...2940...()...47 pax...71%
WATERFORD...1429...(1343)...45 pax...61%
MILAN...8879...(4944)...91pax...65%
ROME FCO...14446...(nil)...147 pax...88%
VENICE...5112...(nil)...150 pax...86%
TRIESTE...2783...(2727)...155 pax...82%
MALTA...3237...(3184)...180 pax...95%
AMSTERDAM...33135...(41741)...107 pax...79%
FARO...26756...(23794)...169 pax...92%
LISBON...2059...(nil)...129 pax...86%
ALICANTE...33555...(26332)...173 pax...95%
ALMERIA...3703...(3501)...206 pax...96%
BARCELONA...10391...(nil)...148 pax...90%
GIRONA...6229...(4442)...173 pax...92%
IBIZA...14360...(10476)....180 pax...93%
MAHON...7596...(6905)...200 pax...93%
MALAGA...45017...(33378)...169 pax...93%
MURCIA...10580...(10530)...151 pax...90%
PALMA...34650...(23116)...162 pax...91%
REUS...4795...(4614)...171 pax...91%
ARRECIFE...11597...(9818)...187 pax...95%
FUERTEVENTURA...6868...(6465)...191 pax...95%
LAS PALMAS...8163...(6582)...186 pax...95%
TENERIFE...17833...(18935)...186 pax...93%
DUBROVNIK...3095...(843)...129 pax...83%
ZURICH...13374...(13569)...72 pax...74%
BODRUM...4545...(3489)...162 pax...93%
ISTANBUL...8147...(5451)...131 pax...80%
DALAMAN...11576...(7064)...187 pax...93%
PRAGUE...134 pax...(nil)...134 pax...91%
BUDAPEST...3120...(nil)...173 pax...92%
KAUNAS...3074...(3117)...171 Pax...90%
BYDGOSZCZ...4458...(4690)...171 Pax..91%
GDANSK/2823...(3258)...176 pax...93%
KATOWICE...4906...(3191)...175 pax...93%
RZESNOW...3192...(3231)...177 pax...94%
BRATISLAVA...4568...(4610)...176 pax...93%
ASHKHABAD...5597...(5540)...155 pax...84%
YEREVAN...477...(nil)...48 pax
DUBAI...40338...(41568)...325 pax...79%
ISLAMABAD...6791...(6655)...200 pax...57%
TORONTO...3374...(3379)...337 pax...98%
NEWARK...9567...(8762)...154 pax...91%
Pete
Last edited by OltonPete; 17th Sep 2012 at 20:41.
Reason: spelling
Cheers, planespotter.net still showing a few with 66 seats, they seem spot on with some airlines such as EK but not so hot on others.
Aer Lingus - Dublin summer 2013 showing three daily every day at present up two flights a week (weekend).
flybe
flybe seem to be adjusting ABZ again with 175's showing departing early morning to BHX & MAN but both evening flights now showing as Q400's which makes no sense at all.
A300, PE with brekky, hopefully won't be left with a sour taste. Transferred the flight booked from Brummy back up to MAN despite the extra cost, don't fancy "some random eastern european carrier".
Late night cock up at T2-baggage goes to T1
