Not surprising - the CAA passenger figures for June 2007 published yesterday make particularly poor reading for Manchester.
Manchester-Boston was 4,664 passengers and Manchester-Miami (which is a through-flight extension of the AA95) was 4,256. Add the two together equals 8,920 passengers. That's down 10% versus last year. Daily 757 with 188 seats x 30 days x 2 sectors equals 11,280 seats so 79% loadfactor which isn't great for transatlantic in June. Obviously we've no idea what price they are selling the seats for but this indicator isn't too healthy.
Delta are also having an awful time on MAN-JFK. Total JFK pax figures (DL+BA+PK) were down 27% versus last year in June and DL's loadfactor hasn't risen above 60% for the last three months. The service is being cut back to five per week with a 757 for the winter. Although passenger figures to Atlanta increased versus last year, the 767-400 at 285 seats indicates a loadfactor of 73% with 12,631 pax carried.
Manchester-Toronto passengers were down 38%, and only Calgary, Vancouver, Orlando and Philadelphia showed reasonable growth on the transatlantic front.
Unless this starts to get better, it would not be surprising to see some more long-haul cuts.