Dollar Bill, My sources in relation to SFO and Ethiad came from within the company, I'm not advocating that they operate those routes. In June 2008 when announcing that they were stopping winter flights to BOS and JFK from Shannon, EI made the extraordinary admission that these routes were consistently loss making for over a decade. A business driven airline would have chopped them years ago or at the very least purchased a suitable aircraft for them. Better late than ever.
I still think that political considerations are taken into account in relation to Shannon.
From the decision to purchase 747's in the early 70's to the 767 fiasco in the early 90's to using wide bodies on thin routes , EI seem to have made frequent mistakes with choice of aircraft on the atlantic. I wasn't criticising them for providing surface transport for 1st class passengers from Cork to Shannon. I'm just pointing out that a 757 operation from Cork might provide enough of the lucrative business traffic that is currently using LHR and AMS if these people conclude that flying East to fly west is less convenient than a direct route.
In general I think the addition of narrow bodies for the 1st time since the 707 era is a good move and will become the norm for East Coast destinations in the future.
Last edited by ryan2000; 23rd Feb 2013 at 21:28.