Cost of surface transport, hotels etc are also lower in Winter and it's easier to rebook passengers on alternative flights.
Marginally cheaper for hotels maybe, any diversion last winter made flights loss making. In Feb '10 due to high winds most of the flights that day were diverted to Shannon - and most probably all on that day were loss making. Bus Transport is not any bit cheaper in the winter, the fact they get such little notice and charge premium rates is the reason why diversions are a complete disaster for airlines especially in winter.
Just wondering if CAT 2 or CAT 3 would be left unserviceable for weeks if it failed at Heathrow, Charles De Gaulle or Schiphol. If it's technically impossible to restore it then the IAA are blameless and I'll gladly defend them.
Have you ever heard of a situation where any part of the ILS equipment failed at LHR, CDG, AMS etc? No because those systems are monitored all day and have dedicated specialists on-hand as part of the airport's ground op's plus if any problems arise most probably all are fixed during the night - Cork is a regional airport and the cost of that kind of monitoring is non-economical. The IAA are blameless? It's a system error that they have been continually trying to fix. The main reason has to be the G/S but there's rumors the hole system failed, and didn't even go to alarm.
just heard ATC tell aircraft that CAT II will be restored this afternoon believe it when I see it
Can confirm the same, G/S was fixed overnight and will be allowed back into service later this evening (last I heard). This has been the driving factor in preventing landings in CAT II conditions. IAA have been allowed to re-introduce CAT II on 17 only because the full system will be fully re-calibrated in just over a week.