GATWICK

[Gulfstreamaviator]

Moscow SVO v DME

When DME was privatised, and Swiss became the first International carrier it was fantastic, then other International carriers were attracted.

It had a light interior, the terminal was modern, baggage belts that worked, customs that worked too.

Any in those days 5 mins walk from car park to terminal entrance.

SVO was the pits in the terminal, and on the runways and taxiways, to say nothing about the ramp.

The Business route to airside in DME was excellent, facilities excellent too.

Thats wht DME became popular, not withstanding that the airport charges were reasonable.

Then the direct train service opened and passengers could get to the airport reasonably easy, and no taxi rip offs.

Only downside at DME was the Airport hotel..... The only hotel when at breakfast you could not see across the room due to crew smoking. The only consumable that I would touch was the nescafe.... in a BIG tin. I would walk to terminal for a fantastic coffee and danish....

Thats why DME took SVO's business.

[adfly]

Aegean

Will no longer transfer the daily LCA to LGW, it will remain at LHR and operate 6 weekly as of 28th Oct. (A320)

The planned 4 weekly ATH flights from LGW will now operate Daily (A321)

LHR-ATH reduced to 11 weekly vs 24 weekly last winter (A320/A321)

Aegean Airlines Further Revises Planned London Operation in W12 | Airline Route – Worldwide Airline Route Updates

[Tagron]

Moscow

BA and Aeroflot are both authorised to operate 21 services each week between London and Moscow under the current Air Service Agreement. BA have had three flights per day between LHR and DME for several years though not always seven days a week. But since the start of S12 they are using their full allocation with 1 x 747 and 2 x 767 daily.

Temporarily they are also running the two daily ex-BMI A321s.

I agree with the previous posters that SVO is (or was when I was last there) a dump, one of the most depressing airports I operated to, even worse than LAX.. So why is BA proposing to try it again ? I think Aksai Oiler is right, it's partly catchment area and partly connections. But the extra factor may be the Air Service Agreement which I believe is due for re negotiation. Russia recently liberalised its bilaterals with France and Italy and Transaero are expanding aggressively in those markets. BA could be positioning itself for a similar outcome to the UK negotiations.

And why LGW not LHR ? Perhaps they do not want to allocate any more longhaul capacity to what is really a shorthaul route, and using LGW helps differentiate the product. And they could be hoping for a new feed to those LGW leisure routes.

[adfly]

WOW Air?

Down on Wiki as WOW Air transferring their STN-KEF service to LGW from 24th September, any substance behind this?

[True Blue]

WOW

Lgw flights on their site.

[adfly]

Seems to operate weekly until December when it increases to 2 weekly. Would have thought WOW would have stayed at STN with little competition there (2 weekly Iceland Express) whereas @ LGW they have a daily Iceland Express flight and 2 weekly Icelandair to worry about.

[BAladdy]

BACF and Titan operating for BA ex LGW this weekend!

BA have once again had to call on Titan Airways to operate some of there services ex LGW. BA are using a Titan Airways 737 (G-POWC) and it's 757 (G-ZAPX) to operate flights to a number of different destinations. The aircraft are planned to operate:

737-300

10AUG - LGW-BOD-LGW-EDI-LGW-BOD-LGW
11AUG - LGW-FCO-LGW-MRS-LGW
12AUG - LGW-MAN-LGW-GLA-LGW-JER-LGW-AMS-LGW
13AUG - LGW-BOD-LGW-MAN-LGW-VCE-LGW
14AUG - LGW-EDI-LGW-GLA-JER-LGW-PSA-LGW
15AUG - LGW-EDI-LGW-GLA-JER-LGW-PSA-LGW
16AUG - LGW-NCE-LGW-RAK-LGW
17AUG - LGW-GLA-LGW-PSA-LGW

The 737 appears to be operating in a one class 130Y config

757

10AUG - LGW-NAP-LGW-AGP-LGW
11AUG - No Flights shown
12AUG - LGW-IBZ-LGW
13AUG - LGW-PFO-LGW-IBZ-LGW
14AUG - LGW-AGP-LGW-BOD-LGW
15AUG - No flights shown
16AUG - LGW-NAP-LGW-AGP-LGW
17AUG - LGW-PFO-LGW-VCE-LGW

The 757 has be configured to offer a 2 class (CE/ET) service

There is the possibility that over the next week that the G-ZAPX may be swapped with G-POWH and the 737 G-POWC with one of the other Titan 737's.

BA will also use a BACF E170 on the LGW-MAN route tomorrow in place of the usual LGW based 737. The 76 seater E170 is showing as operating the following flights:

BA2902 LGW 06:40 MAN 07:40
BA2903 MAN 08:20 LGW 09:25
BA2906 LGW 10:25 MAN 11:25
BA2907 MAN 12:00 LGW 13:05
BA2908 LGW 15:50 MAN 16:50
BA2909 MAN 17:25 LGW 18:25

Does anyone know if this is all down to serviceability problems with the 737 fleet or is it operational problems with crew??

[cornishsimon]

It's aircraft issues not crew issues

[True Blue]

Colombo

CMB now available on the BA site.

[fokker1000]

LGW runway temporary closure 18 Aug?

Gatwick's main runway 26L was shut for half an hour or so on 18th Aug. Does anyone know why? I know they are digging parts up at night, but not in the day surely!
Any info? Thanks

[Boeingflyer]

I was there..
An aircraft lost the hydrolic on the field. Dont know what type, couldent see from where we was parked.

[lenhamlad]

According to my KLM piloting friend it was due to a small hole discovered on the runway. He was diverted to LHR.

[BOAC]

a small hole discovered on the runway.

- I hear ATC are looking into it......................

[Red Comet]

It was a spillage of hydraulic fluid from a Thompson aircraft. Closed for around 25 mins.

[ayroplain]

New at LGW. In Departures at the South Terminal, after you have scanned your boarding pass, had your photo taken and passed through the barriers, you have to hand your boarding pass to the conveyor belt people as well.
Unfortunately, you don't learn about this while you are on the queue waiting your turn. By the time they hear about it some people have already put their passes back in their hand-baggage while queueing and now have to go rummaging in the trays thus slowing down the queue even more.

[davidjohnson6]

Ayro - would it be a major thing for GIP to put up some signs telling passengers to keep their boarding passes to hand ?

[ayroplain]

DJ, LGW doesn't do the simple things very well.
I couldn't understand why this procedure was necessary but a fellow passenger to whom I spoke while waiting to board said that he was told by one of the conveyor people that this new rule was brought in because "someone jumped the barriers". Hard to believe but that's what he was told.

[Skipness One Echo]

This is what they do at T3 MAN as well. Slows everything down, all for the sake of not paying ONE human being to check boarding cards at the correct time.

[sewushr]

I thought it was how they accurately measured the queuing time at security? They were caught out a couple of years back I seem to remember by not telling the full story on queue times (which is one of the measured service quality indicators).

Of course it only works if someone scans your boarding pass at the conveyor, but I've certainly seen that happening recently. They then have the time your boarding pass was scanned at the entrance to the security area, and the time you got to the front of the Q

[bjones4]

This is what they do at T3 MAN as well. Slows everything down, all for the sake of not paying ONE human being to check boarding cards at the correct time.

Flew out of T3 on Tuesday morning and they've changed this, there's now one man at the bottom of the ramp into the security area that checks and scans everyones boarding cards, the staff at the belts don't touch them.