No one want to report on the better than expected results?
Good news doesn't get reported here... The doom-mongerers can't get excited about it and foresee the downfall of BA/LHR/British Aviation.
Ok 'good news' is perhaps a bit too far, bit in terms of the loss they were expecting, its relatively bloody brilliant news. Perhaps things are starting to go the right way and all the radical cost cutting is paying off.
This period covers most of the 'will they won't they strike' period (I wonder how much that cost them), but doesn't cover the snow period over January - so that will put a dent in next quarter's results.
A £50m loss sure is a big drop considering what they were profiting a couple of years back, but by the sounds of things (perhaps they meant to make it sound worse to help drive through cost-cutting measures?) it could have been much, much worse.
Maybe that £1b loss is looking unlikely now eh?