BMI
Join Date: Sep 2005
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I assume this aircraft announcement at 7AM tomorrow is the A330s/A321s and not the 20+20 order?
The order that has been publicly put out to tender is not being announced. The order that nobody knew anything about is being announced instead.
Join Date: May 2002
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The baby will continue as is, maybe getting mainline A319s which won't be much use to the new medium/longhaul strategy. It's basically an increase of 5xA330's to the fleet. As Dr Spin states, the A321's were already on their way due to the aqusition of BMED. I think it's Mr Bishop doing the USA thing he's been fighting for for years. I still predict he'll sell the company within the next year and a half.
Regards, The Count
Regards, The Count
Join Date: Jun 2007
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bmi unveils $750 million fleet acquisition plan - five Airbus A330s and five A321s to join fleet
release date: 10/07/2007
bmi today (10 July 2007) announced that its Board has formally approved the strategy of developing new mid haul and long haul routes from London Heathrow and has authorised the acquisition of ten additional aircraft to add to its current fleet.
Five additional Airbus A330s valued at around $500 million will join the three existing A330 aircraft currently in service, with the first new aircraft expected to be delivered in Spring 2008.
Consequent upon the recent acquisition of British Mediterranean Airways (BMED), bmi will also take delivery of five new Airbus A321s valued at $250 million for an expanded medium haul network.
Nigel Turner, chief executive of bmi, said: “I am delighted that we are able to proceed with the development and expansion of our medium and long haul services. Delivery of ten further aircraft will allow the introduction of new routes and upgrade capacity on existing services in these two important sectors of our business.
“Later this year we will be announcing network plans for our long haul operations in 2008.
“An expanded operation of the former BMED network for the 2007/08 winter schedule will be announced shortly with new routes and enhanced frequencies to commence on 28 October 2007 when BMED will be fully integrated into bmi.”
ends
note to editors
• bmi acquired control of the BA franchise airline BMED in February 2007, and is working towards full integration by 28 October 2007
• the addition of the new aircraft will take the bmi group fleet total to 75
release date: 10/07/2007
bmi today (10 July 2007) announced that its Board has formally approved the strategy of developing new mid haul and long haul routes from London Heathrow and has authorised the acquisition of ten additional aircraft to add to its current fleet.
Five additional Airbus A330s valued at around $500 million will join the three existing A330 aircraft currently in service, with the first new aircraft expected to be delivered in Spring 2008.
Consequent upon the recent acquisition of British Mediterranean Airways (BMED), bmi will also take delivery of five new Airbus A321s valued at $250 million for an expanded medium haul network.
Nigel Turner, chief executive of bmi, said: “I am delighted that we are able to proceed with the development and expansion of our medium and long haul services. Delivery of ten further aircraft will allow the introduction of new routes and upgrade capacity on existing services in these two important sectors of our business.
“Later this year we will be announcing network plans for our long haul operations in 2008.
“An expanded operation of the former BMED network for the 2007/08 winter schedule will be announced shortly with new routes and enhanced frequencies to commence on 28 October 2007 when BMED will be fully integrated into bmi.”
ends
note to editors
• bmi acquired control of the BA franchise airline BMED in February 2007, and is working towards full integration by 28 October 2007
• the addition of the new aircraft will take the bmi group fleet total to 75
Heard on the grapevine that Peter Spencer (ex Maersk/Duo) is to be appointed Managing Director at bmi !
Join Date: Feb 2003
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bmibaby isn't going anywhere. For some time the airline was the segment of the group that was keeping the rest of it afloat, with the other arms either only just breaking even or making big losses. Now baby are carrying the most pax of any arm in the group, and what's stopping the airline from being more profitable is our equipment. Hopefully with the new strategy out of Heathrow, mainline will be using higher capacity A320s on the shorthaul routes to free up more slots for mediumhaul for the new A321s and the BMED routes. That should free up A319s for us, as the 737s are getting a bit knackered now!
Join Date: Nov 2005
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Baby Bus
So from what I am lead to belive, the A319s will move to Baby and the Boeing 737 500s will go as these are getting a bit old?
The Boeing 737 300s will be around for some time yet as some of these are newish to the fleet?
The Boeing 737 300s will be around for some time yet as some of these are newish to the fleet?
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Can anyone actually tell me BMI got of the BMed deal? The money they paid was paid back by BA for the BMed 51 BMEd slot pairs. As I see it, they got the BMed operation (aircraft, crews and routes) for free, but without the slots to fly them out of LHR. To me that suggests that they will have excess aircraft and crews - what gives?
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Doesn't appear to be the case, they are looking for applicants to transfer from Baby/Regional to the short haul fleet to fill the gaps left by people moving onto the A330. On top of that they have been recruiting externally for some time.
Join Date: Feb 2005
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I agree, baby are in desperate need of new aircraft, but I understand that 3 500's will be replaced by 3 300's when their leases expire in the next year. Having ex mainline A319's would be nice, but where would they go? BHX could have them to replace their fleet, but they would have to order more to expand there. They could go to CDF and MAN I suppose to replace their aircraft and also to expand their presence by one aircraft each (MAN 5, CDF 4), but it would have to be done at a base at a time (with respect to training and crew conversions). The replaced aircraft could then go to BHX to really make a baby presence felt!! 18 aircraft or so at BHX, awesome!
Baby might then have the capacity to operate spare aircraft as backups, sent at a moments notice to support other aircraft or bases. That would be nice!!
8028410q
Baby might then have the capacity to operate spare aircraft as backups, sent at a moments notice to support other aircraft or bases. That would be nice!!
8028410q
In addition to the new A330s arriving from next year (I heard rumours of two ex-Air China RR Trent powered machines as the only way of getting 2008 deliveries?), bmi needs to find Heathrow slots to continue the 8x A320/A321s of work absorbed from BMed for which the Heathrow slots have been pre-sold to BA.
Other rumblings I have heard suggest that:
MAN-LAS/BGI/ANU will be dropped and picked up by Virgin, cutting back on MAN-Orlando to serve the extra destinations from Manchester using the
existing 747-400 fleet "based" there.
MAN-Heathrow will be dropped. It is performing very poorly indeed with low loadfactors due mostly to lack of connecting traffic and strong competition from Virgin trains.
If one assumes that this is correct - it might not be - then it would suggest that three A330s will be available for new activity next year (two ex Air China and one ex MAN) and that if each aircraft flies a daily roundtrip, they will need 11 daily slots at LHR to free up from other activity. (3 x A330s plus 8 x BMed aircraft = 11).
If MAN-LHR was dropped (seven per day) then you're probably looking at routes like TeesSide-LHR (four per day) or a combination of Hannover-LHR (three per day) plus the extra "slot sitter" on Leeds-LHR (one per day) being dropped to provide LHR slots to fly the programme.
If Manchester-Heathrow is as bad as is being suggested, this could be a "quick hit" to free up Heathrow slots without mass carnage being inflicted on the bmi network as a whole.
Other rumblings I have heard suggest that:
MAN-LAS/BGI/ANU will be dropped and picked up by Virgin, cutting back on MAN-Orlando to serve the extra destinations from Manchester using the
existing 747-400 fleet "based" there.
MAN-Heathrow will be dropped. It is performing very poorly indeed with low loadfactors due mostly to lack of connecting traffic and strong competition from Virgin trains.
If one assumes that this is correct - it might not be - then it would suggest that three A330s will be available for new activity next year (two ex Air China and one ex MAN) and that if each aircraft flies a daily roundtrip, they will need 11 daily slots at LHR to free up from other activity. (3 x A330s plus 8 x BMed aircraft = 11).
If MAN-LHR was dropped (seven per day) then you're probably looking at routes like TeesSide-LHR (four per day) or a combination of Hannover-LHR (three per day) plus the extra "slot sitter" on Leeds-LHR (one per day) being dropped to provide LHR slots to fly the programme.
If Manchester-Heathrow is as bad as is being suggested, this could be a "quick hit" to free up Heathrow slots without mass carnage being inflicted on the bmi network as a whole.
Join Date: Oct 2005
Location: Near MME, England, UK
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I do believe my local MME will fall victim to bmi's axe, although I have been told that they are staying for the winter, with the Saturday evening night-stopper being upgraded from an E145 to an A319, but what I can't understand is, why chop entire routes? Why not just take one rotation of LBA, one or two off MME, one or two off MAN, etc etc, that way, you free up slots, and keep the regional routes to feed the new long haul routes?
Lady Lexxington
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In this months internal mag there is talk of reduced shorthaul frequencies. Oct 28th is the start of the winter season, that's when we'll all know more.
Join Date: Dec 2000
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Talking of which what happened to the 4 Embraers bmi were getting in 'early 2007' as announced in a press release on the 10th January? None have been added this year yet as far as I can make out.