Originally Posted by
Alteagod
Was SSH in Egypt not near a full day plus xtra crew carried as well from Belfast. Did it not do an early PMI beforehand
TUI base only one aircraft at BFS during the summer season, and is the airline's only seasonal base. TUI's sole aircraft has a full schedule, meaning in order to add Cape Verde or Egypt, other routes will need to be axed.
It is possible to operate both PMI and Cape Verde within in a 24 hour period, but the logistics of doing so from BFS make it an unattractive option.
TUI's morning departures to Spain leave BFS between 05:30-06:00. That means that the latest an aircraft returning from Cape Verde can arrive at BFS is 04:30-05:00. This requires the previous morning's departure to Spain to leave before 05:00, which on some days forces the evening before's flight to be shifted further forward and so on. Given that the vast majority of TUI's routes from BFS are operated by other airlines, passengers would choose their more convenient departure times over an extremely early TUI departure.
In addition, TUI's afternoon departures are to destinations only served x1 weekly, except for on a Tuesday, when a second weekly flight to REU and fourth weekly flight to PMI operate instead. Logic would dictate that TUI would choose Tuesday to operate a potential route to Cape Verde, as they wouldn't want to completely axe one of their destinations from BFS. So TUI would replace x2 flights to Spain with x1 flight to Cape Verde. This means that TUI would offer 6,803 fewer seats from BFS each year, which is 6.25% of the total available seats offered from BFS in 2018. TUI would consequently make less money from BFS, given the average price spent per person on a trip to Cape Verde does not exceed that of a trip to REU and a trip to PMI.
So, by operating a route to Cape Verde from BFS;
-TUI offer fewer seats from BFS and makes less money from their base.
-Fewer passengers fly to Spain with TUI because of unattractive flight times, meaning the airline makes even less money.
While it would be great to see TUI offering more destinations from BFS, the fact that BFS is TUI's sole seasonal base, and is operated by a Sunwing aircraft, makes it clear that TUI are not interested in the NI market. A permanent base, or at least a second aircraft, would make destinations such as Cape Verde a more feasible option, but by the looks of things, what BFS has currently got is as good as it gets from TUI.