"CAP493" Monarch does park aircraft at LGW on a regular basis in the winter months due to low flying programmes in the winter.
The problem Monarch has with parking is LTN is a main maintenance base for Monarch with 3 hangars. Sometimes aircraft "C" checks overrun and so an aircraft may have to be parked outside until its slot in the hangar is available.
This happens with 3rd party aircraft that MAEL (Monarch Aircraft Engineering Ltd) carry out maintenance on, which Monarch foots the parking bill if the hangar slot is not available.
Now it would be no problem for Monarch if it shuts down its MAEL operation and make the couple of hundred employees redundant and transfer its work overseas. I am sure Luton and surrounding areas could do with more people on the dole and the all the shops losing trade. MAEL adds a fair number of extra contractors in the winter which helps the local areas.
Yes l know it is a balancing job LTN airport has with its lack of parking space, so you can see it is not straight forward.
Airlines are all ready getting flack from the greens and media for flying a/c empty, so when Mon have to ferry a/c to MAN to save on parking fees and ferry back when the hangar slot is available, who is going to be at fault?
