Originally Posted by
FRatSTN
Absolutely. They closed those bases in order to consolidate their Gatwick position and what have they ended up with? A return to split terminal operations and a network riddled with staff shortfalls, major disruption and in the end mass cancellations.
Closing the SEN and NCL bases during the pandemic was perhaps understandable, they can realistically return to either of those airports with based frames when the time is right. The STN closure is the costly mistake as will be very difficult to return in the short-medium term. People argue the Ryanair dominance there saw them off over the years, but having now decided to venture into the package holiday market, they've allowed perhaps their biggest emerging competitor in the form of Jet2 to solidify it's position at STN, and they have the resources to deal with it!
A return to STN by easyJet as it was would amount to nothing short of commercial suicide. Competing routes to EDI/BFS/GLA are hugely contested as an example. Let's see how that fairs out . . The wise thing for easyJet would be to continue to grow their business at airports not very accessible to new entrants or by lower cost rivals eg LGW, CDG, ORY, LIS etc. That's where the margins are for easyJet