Originally Posted by
OzzyOzBorn
Thanks, LBAflyer22.
Jet2 is one of the four bellweather carriers which portend the tone for the forthcoming season at MAN, the others being Ryanair (RYR/RUK/LDA), EasyJet (EZY/EJU) and TUI (TOM). If all of these show a healthy increase in capacity at start of season, then things look good.
In ACL's initial coordination report for S23, Jet2 was shown to hold 17,283 slots representing 3,871,873 seats. Since then, there has been a further update showing 16,606 slots held for the season, though I have not seen the commensurate number for reduction in seats.
This compares with Summer '22 numbers of 16,125 slots held representing 3,468,653 seats in that year's start of season ACL report.
That would indicate Jet2 offering 403,220 additional seats based on the initial filing, but we see that 677 slots seem to have been deducted since then. Whilst a larger aircraft is expected to be in the mix, some reduction from the original +403,220 should be anticipated. However, an increase in seats offered over the S22 total still looks a safe bet. I will await the next ACL report with interest.
Of course, the benchmark year most of us would like to see surpassed is pre-covid 2019.
The MAT (Moving Annual Total) for the 12 months to September 2019 (the peak of recorded stats at MAN prior to numbers falling away, then plunging) were reported as:
PAX Terminal & Transit: 29,510,599
Movements: 204,178
Freight & Mail: 113,248 Tonnes.
By comparison, the latest reported MAT's for the 12 months to the end of January 2023 are:
PAX Terminal & Transit: 24,310,746
Movements: 162,480
Freight & Mail: 65,460 Tonnes.
From these numbers, we see that MAN must recover a further 5,199,853 pax within the MAT in order to re-enter record territory.
The month of February 2022 was still amidst full covid recession; things began to change in March. April was the first "normal" month. So February and March 2023 numbers should again make decent inroads into that shortfall. However, from April onwards we start to compare months with more like-for-like conditions, so the rate of incremental gains will slow to the kind of percentages we became accustomed to in pre-covid years. Obviously, it would be great if positive momentum can be maintained once we hit that point, but as discussed earlier, bumper business is far from assured with some markets not back at scale, and the public dealing with the soaring cost of living and possible recession. In the leisure market, the risk is that operators will consolidate capacity if the bookings don't come rolling in at the volumes hoped for.
The 2019 movements total was disproportionately boosted by the high number of FlyBe movements using smaller types. We will probably face a long wait to break any movements records at MAN going forward.
The abject cargo number is the inevitable endgame of MAG's "Anywhere but Manchester" policy. There is no hope of meaningful recovery in that sector for as long as MAG persist with the current strategy. There should be a rise in tonnage as more capacity returns to long-haul services offering belly-hold space, but MAN now has NO scheduled cargo services whatsoever since the loss of the short-lived Lufthansa A321F service. I believe that this is the first time in my lifetime that MAN has had ZERO scheduled freighter services - and I'm absolutely ancient! Joking aside, it is sad to see such a situation - such a dramatic contrast with the cargo heyday of the 2000-2010 period. Still, I'm sure that certain executives will have been handsomely rewarded for switch-selling MAN's freighter throughput to other airports.
Returning to passenger numbers and comparisons with 2019. In that year, Thomas Cook Airlines held 10,097 slots representing 2,441,653 seats for the Summer season alone. The equivalent Summer season numbers for FlyBe were 19,882 slots representing 1,688,548 seats. Naturally, other companies have seen changes too - but these are the really substantial ones. So it is not enough for our remaining stalwart companies to increase over their own 2019 programmes; we need to see the deficits from lost operators backfilled too. And that's why the effort to break out to new highs on passenger throughput may yet prove to be an arduous slog against the backdrop of difficult economic conditions. Will current carriers' programmes advance sufficiently to offset those major players lost to the great hangar in the sky?