It's all very well saying you need to know who's up front.
However if the "virtual" airline doesn't tell you which operator is actually flying the plane until you get on to the apron and see it, so what chance do you have? I assume that if you said as you boarded, I don't like the look of this aircraft/crew etc, the chances of a refund would be nil.
The case of Mr Lee is indeed very sad. I wonder what his real issue was - whether he knew that approaches were flown illegally and that he felt he would not have allowed the Captain to have taken the executive desision to continue? Or perhaps whether he was all too aware of the practices within Flightline and the broader Manx2 operation which could have led to the crew feeling so pressured as to make the decsions which ultimately appear to have led to the incident.
I would hope that he did not, as reported in some publications, feel that he could have done better flying the approaches, as it is incontrovertibly shown that by commencing all three, the crew were in breach of legislation.
Well done to Radio 4 for a balanced piece of work, very thought provoking. It's interesting to note that R4 have picked up on the fact that the crew made 3 illegal approaches, a fact which the IOM media seemed to be reluctant to report.
The quote about EasyJet (and inference to Flybe also) about being able to land in lesser visibility was quite an insight into the thought processes of those at the helm of Manx2.