Heli Shuttle service
Slight drift but on hearing of the demise of the Scilly Isles shuttle and having a good friend who bought flight shares from BIH twenty years ago, he tells me that even today he needs to book seats before Christmas for the summer even as a shareholder! He also says that as far back as he can remember the S-61 has always been full.
So wishing I was a younger 'go-getter' again, I have to ask whether the service could be continued on a charter basis using something more modern and probably smaller ... 139 perhaps or similar. It seems probable that the owners of Tresco might not permit a new service but the public airport at St Just is available. The schedule fare was around £120 and was flying around six flights a day, twelve months in the year, but I'm told that most of the posh holiday home owners would not be too concerned at a price hike as long as the service was there. The 61 flight time was around 20 minutes and it might be possible to take in the other islands.
When Nicolas Ridley sounded the death knell for the LGW-LHR S-61 shuttle, and being based at Redhill, I did produce a business plan to do a ditto on a charter basis, and in fact talked to quite a few of the airlines who were positive to the point of offering some subsidy to see the operation continue. At the time, even the LHR ATC guys seemed co-operative using the southern runway only for IFR.
I was a real business busy bee then and just didn't have the time to see the idea through, so I never discovered if I would have made a few bob or gone bust! Any ideas out there?
Take care all. Dennis K.