ABERDEEN

[CaptainDoony]

I was going to say the Transavia charters have been in for the Subsea Expo but there have been 3 in the last couple of weeks now all of which I believe only carried pax AMS-ABZ and positioned back empty to AMS.

[Richard Taylor]

bmi Regional

Bmi Regional goes all-economy - Business Traveller

[Richard Taylor]

Helicopter pilot shortage looms?

Warnings of North Sea helicopter pilot shortage - The Scotsman

Seems the record investment & developments in the offing is putting pressure on the big three.

Yet I also read exploration is falling off a cliff, although things like decommissioning once it properly gets going may also provide work for the heli firms.

Certainly mixed messages when it comes to the UKCS just now.

[CaptainDoony]

2013 Full Year Statistics

Hi all, here are the full route statistics for 2013. Full CAA stats aren't published yet so there may be some slight differences but figures should be almost completely accurate.

Domestic - (Scheduled/Seasonal)

Route / 2013 Total Pax / % Change
Heathrow / 712184 / 7.3
Manchester / 203347 / 12.5
Gatwick / 173231 / -25.9
Sumburgh / 115283 / 53.3
Birmingham / 96789 / 10.8
Luton / 82787 / -31.0
London City / 73076 / 362.7
Norwich / 63782 / -1.3
Kirkwall / 48633 / 3.1
Bristol / 34915 / 6.2
Humberside / 34178 / 6.2
DTV / 32732 / -2.1
Newcastle / 30759 / 23.8
Belfast / 30205 / 40.5
East Midlands / 18411 / -7.0
Wick / 13874 / -5.2
Cardiff / 13242 / -5.9
Leeds / 12349 / ----
Southampton / 9501 / -41.7
Stornoway / 5476 / -1.4
Jersey / 2209 / ----

Total Domestic Pax - 1,805,919

International - (Scheduled/Seasonal)

Amsterdam / 291570 / 3.6
Stavanger / 164409 / -1.5
Frankfurt / 146270 / 9.0
Paris / 106937 / -0.5
Bergen / 54434 / 5.7
Copenhagen / 46157 / -17.3
Dublin / 41568 / 12.2
Tenerife / 27146 / 3.0
Palma / 23411 / ----
Dalaman / 13086 / ----
Esbjerg / 9875 / -12.6
Bourgas / 5559 / ----
Malaga / 4116 / ----
Reus / 3843 / ----
Barcelona / 3522 / ----
Mahon / 3352 / ----
Oslo / 2254 / ----
Kristiansund / 2141 / ----
Ibiza / 1403 / ----
Enfidha / 1354 / ----
Groningen / 123 / -96.1

Total International Pax - 952,530

Domestic Charter - (IAC & ad-hoc)

Scatsta / 165736
Inverness / 151
Glasgow / 132
Edinburgh / 82
Liverpool / 80
Southend / 74
Farnborough / 52
Aberdeen / 28
Lerwick / 3
Biggin Hill / 2
DSA / 2

Total Domestic Charter Pax - 167,383

International Charter - (Heli's and ad-hoc)

Oil Rigs / 507365
Floro / 1259
Verona / 878
Vagar / 871
Naples / 592
Kristiansund / 498 (Pre BM)
Riga / 398
Dubrovnik / 290
Genoa / 290
Donegal / 276
Graz / 199
Shannon / 192
Rovaniemi / 186
Haugesund / 113
Keflavik / 98
Gdansk / 76
Astana / 47
Billund / 46
Sandjeford / 46
Trondheim / 45
Dusseldorf / 45
Maastricht / 42
Marseille / 26
Palanga / 24
Biarritz / 20
Dijon / 2
Geneva / 1

Total International Charter Pax - 513,925

2013 Total Pax - 3,439,757

[ANYWHERE BUT ABZ]

Good to see growth in certain areas, a few expected drops such as Gatwick but according to baa your about 50k pax missing, thought figures were nearer 3.5 mil

[CaptainDoony]

The figures published by AAL always seem to be inflated by a good 5-6k per month. I don't know if they're rounding their figures up but it's the same story each month.

Take the previous record high of 2007:

BAA: 3.479m
CAA: 3.412m

And in 2013:

AAL: 3.488m
CAA: 3.439m

[Richard Taylor]

Thanks Capt Doony.

Should Easy be worried about the drops in LGW/LTN, or is it all explained by decreased freqs?

CPH showing a bit of a fall.

Good to see KSU not that far behind OSL, although OSL now on increased freq.

Just shows you, behind the headline increased figure, there are many ups and downs.

[ANYWHERE BUT ABZ]

Think more reduced frequency and no flybe on Gatwick route

[ANYWHERE BUT ABZ]

251,396 pax for January 2014.

Pretty much a 10% jump on last year and that's without the new Riga and sas Oslo service yet to begin,

I think the time has come for money to be pumped into airport development instead of window dressing the problems, bigger apron and bigger terminal

[c2lass]

Does anyone know what the "emergency" was at ABZ this morning?

We were flying back from Abu Dhabi via the 10.40 FRA and half an hour into the journey the pilot advised he had been informed that there would be a delay in landing due to an emergency at ABZ and he had been advised that we were hoping to land 20 mins later than scheduled.

We did land just before 12 and all looked OK at Aberdeen and nothing on the news or social media.

Just curious as to what had happened.

Thanks

[tiger88]

I don't know the nature of the urgency/emergancy situation but I know a Bristow's S92 declared a pan yesterday morning which held up some of the flights. It landed safely and was followed in by the emergency services.

[CabinCrewe]

Seems to be two TOM TFS flights per week next winter M + F

[CaptainDoony]

On the topic of TOM, their current TFS flight is just about to land - 12 hours late!

[Richard Taylor]

Ferrovial

Reported on various sites that Ferrovial are about to - or have - made an approach to HAH with an £800m bid to buy ABZ, GLA & SOU as a package.

[ANYWHERE BUT ABZ]

Well there goes my hope for gip an some proper investment

[Richard Taylor]

If GIP or anyone else were still contemplating putting in an official bid they'd best get their bid together pronto!

GIP have approached HAH about ABZ more than once, but reportedly without putting in any official bid. Now or never methinks.

[CabinCrewe]

on the face of it Ferrovial may have a lot of disposable cash, something currently im not sure could be the same for GIP after all their recent investments. May not be the build em up sell em off policy of GIP either.

[CaptainDoony]

KLM

I see KLM will be going to 6x daily ABZ-AMS Sunday only from the start of June until the end of S14.

I believe they have tried it twice before; once just after the economy went into meltdown and the second during S12. Both during times of uncertainty so with the economy seemingly improving markedly could they be testing the water for a return to 6x daily in the near-ish future?

AMS was up another 8% in January as well and will likely exceed 300,000 pax p.a. For the first time. Not a lot of routes that I can think of that can support such numbers and only have one carrier.

[ANYWHERE BUT ABZ]

Where do u get all this info? I remember someone saying Belfast was going double daily and I think maybe it was sas Oslo going 6 x weekly etc but can't find any info on this

Also if only Sunday why don't they do 6 x daily say everyday apart from a Saturday, I'm sure te demand is there,

Still waiting for a charter carrier to come to Aberdeen an launch flights instead of travelling to glasgow/Edinburgh, hello jet2???

I also believe Gatwick could be done 3 x daily with a an a320, flights always full, Luton 2 x daily and Frankfurt during summer 4 x daily, all well and good but need stands to park them, something Aberdeen is lacking big time

[CaptainDoony]

It is confirmed and bookable on KLM's website. Same goes for SK OSL. Double daily BHD appeared in Flybe's online timetable for a while but appears to have been an error.

Jet2 have expressed an interest in serving ABZ before when they launched their GLA base. I would hope that if ls are looking to expand then ABZ is fairly high up the list. ABZ reckon a catchment of 300k is unfulfilled every year to the Med/Spain a year. Surely got to be of interest to someone but the only people who know for sure are Jet2 mgmt.