Eastern aren't interested in the CRJ-900s (at least that is what they told Airliner World magazine.)

In the Airliner World article they practically ruled out purchasing any new aircraft.

I see they have launched a new website, incorporating their new logo. It is hasn't changed all that much from the last one, but I like it! It certainly puts across the Eastern professional touch.

mmeteesside

I see from there Website they only have 2 x J32s left wonder when they are due to leave the Fleet ?

I want the pretty stewardess back, nice website otherwise! :{ :E

I also notice that IOM is listed as a destination from ABZ (& vice versa) but no flights bookable. Looks like this could be the 1st of the new destinations T3 said they were looking at for ABZ.

Just seen that Eastern Airways won the Gold Regional Airline of the Year award from the European Regional Airline Association!

Quite an achievement (first UK airline ever to win this?)

Congratulations to everyone at Eastern!!

They deserve it!

its poop
 

wel... seem to be the only one saying this.. but that new livery is pants! its really a poor effort, a nasty blue and looks soooo bad on the J41.. the front of the aircraft just looks bland too like that..

it looks like... a really bad virtual airline livery people.. walked past it parked at Leeds and its just as bad stood next to it... yuk :=

GlobusAIr

Congratulations, You are the only person to have said this so far, I speak for many people who think that it makes the Jetstream fleet look a lot younger and dynamic, and the new look goes with winning the Gold Award hand in hand:ok:

IOM is served from ABZ, but via NCL. As far as Iam aware there are no plans to start a direct service from ABZ.

As an aside, G-MAJL is the only one to be painted with the old style bird (albiet upside down) all the rest have the new flag style.

We didnt think that the new livery was that good at first, but when your up close and see them, it certainly grows on you and is a big improvement from the last one. I think everyone is in agreement, there is a little more red required perhaps!!

CSN:ok:

yes,,, more red at the very least.

the thing is... it looks like they just forgot the front of the aircraft! its white with a tiny t3 logo now!

maybe they got a discount on blue paint from B&Q.

yes... better than the last but anything is better than the old job :O

In ref; to G-MAJL ... that was the airframe i walked past at leeds and the change to the tail logo on the rest of the new paint jobs is much better! so i admit thats ok Wellington Bomber.

I dont work for jet2 thanks...

Nice to see they are milking all they can get out of that Gold Award! Posters at check in, and big stickers on the cockpit door already.

I must say they thoroughly deserved it, flew with them for the first time on Friday and thoroughly looking forward to doing so again on Monday.

good to hear that at least one airline makes flying a pleasant experience.....I was just thinking how really poor the experience has become over the last couple of years.

As anybody noticed the latest J41 operating this week from HUY - ABZ the reg no JY

A colleague with no particular interest in aviation flew NCL-BHX-NCL the other day and made the same sort of comments - felt like flying on a 'proper' airline (even if it was 'a little thing with propellers!') and the experience compared well against the BA NCL-LHR-NCL they are used to.

SWBKCB

Have done the NCL-BHX many times & yes they do try and the enthusiasm shows. But at the end of the day it comes down to 'you only get what you pay for' & this is not a Loco operation.

Do T3 still have their "engineering outstation" or whatever they want to call it out at PIK?

Couple of J41s there at moment, are these bound for T3 or elsewhere, or for breaking-up?

Do T3 expect to expand their J41 fleet, or acquire more S20 for that matter?

Thanks :ok:

Yes I believe there are (at least) 5 still there, bound for Eastern.

I don't think they are planning any more Saab 2000's yet though.

Scott

Jenkins:

I don't know when Eastern's J41 leases expire but obviously their lease rentals are non-negotiable until then. Come lease renewal time, of course there's scope for change, but there's not exactly an excess of demand over supply for Jetstreams at the moment so I would have thought that flyBE (if indeed they are the beneficial owners of the aircraft) would just be happy to be getting some revenue stream rather than driving Eastern to take other J41s. So I wouldn't see that as a major threat to Eastern's cost base.

Incidentally, ACAS says that the J41s which Eastern operates but doesn't own are owned by a company called "Trident Aviation Leasing" in Jersey. Are you sure that the ultimate owner of those J41s is BACX/BA Connect (and hence perhaps now flyBE), or did big BA keep the ownership?

C.

The Jetstreams were of course around long before BACX/BACON and any of that lot, operating with British Airways Regional. For this reason it is quite possible that BA are the owners of the leases.

If FlyBe do take over the lease they wont be in any position to raise the charges to Eastern, due to the fact that most of the JS41s on the market are currently actively being re-homed. Even if FlyBe withdrew the lease entirely, Eastern would most likely be able to locate a similar number of Jetstreams elsewhere.

At the end of the day I imagine the lease will either remain quietly with BA, or get transferred quietly to FlyBe, with minimum of fuss.

Jetsteam Leases
 

The BAe Jetstreams transfered from BA Connect is a sub lease arrangement. BA Connect are responsible for returning the a/c to the lessor at the end of the lease arrangement, which at the moment covers a period between 2007 and 2009.

jethro
UK and Ireland Airline Fleet Listings
http://www.jethros.i12.com

Ah, but Eastern sub lease the J41's on favourable terms(or at least they did when BACON, then BACitiexpress, offloaded the fleet i.e. BACON pay part of the leasing costs). I wonder if this cosy arrangement can continue or is this why BACON continues to exist as a company?

Is it possible that the JS41s that have recently arrived & those about to go into service are to replace the earlier models they have on lease as & when those leases start expiring?

By the way, this evening's tea-time departures southbound out of ABZ (to NCL, MME, HUY, LBA, EMA & NWI) were all running about 1hr late, give or take 5-10mins either side.

Anyone know why this was - could be they were just switching Jetstreams around, can't believe they all went u/s!

I'm wondering if there was some sort of meeting/announcement at ABZ re possible new routes...or it could have been just a traffic jam at ABZ!

Edited: It was a fire alarm at ABZ terminal, someone burned the rowies again. So there WAS an announcement at ABZ...GET OOT O THE TERMINAL!! ;o)

Eastern Airways - expansion plans for 2007?
 

Does anyone know what T3 have in mind for the coming year in terms of expansion from the likes of ABZ/MME/HUY/NCL, if anything?

Are all their JS41s employed, or do they have spare capacity?

Any more aircraft (JS41/SB20 or even - E145!) on the horizon or are they happy with what they have.

I know they are due to stop NCL-LCY, & they have alluded to more for ABZ, but nothing has materialized so far.

Would they stick to UK expansion only, or (as with MME-BRU) are they starting to look further afield.

:ok:

From what i can tell T3 have a spare saab 2000 but looks like the j41's are in use. Any IOM plans?? IOM - LCY could work with a j41:bored:

At the current schedule I believe they have around 5-6 J41's spare and 1-2 Saab 2000's....dumping NCL-LCY from the end of this week gives them another J41 to play with.

Do any of you guys think that there is any potential for any more routes out of EMA. For example, IOM hasn't been served for many years after Euromanx pulled off. Is there any chance of a route to LCY because the midlands has not been linked to London since BD came off the routes from EMA and BHX many years ago (surely aircraft as small as T3 operate can satisfy such routes, even though its not far-I would certainly use it).

Thanks
SAM-EMA

Heard a rumour that there was a J41 going to WIC are they going down to a 2 type Aircraft Fleet ? Noticed J31 painted in new livery so maybe not true. :rolleyes:

Still 2/3 JS31/2s around, usually G-BUVC/D at ABZ, G-IJYS around somewhere as well I think.

Restricted to WIC-ABZ-SYY-ABZ-WIC.

How are T3 coping vs. the loco competition (especially Flybe). Seen so many rumours that Flybe would compete on routes at NCL & ABZ but thus far they haven't really launched an all-out assault against T3.

At ABZ, only compete on LBA-ABZ, but T3 pulled off BFS-ABZ a couple of years back when BE launched BHD-ABZ, & BE pulled the NWI-ABZ route which T3 fly just as the start date loomed. Also rumours BE would start SOU-ABZ & NCL-ABZ against T3 (& return to launch NWI-ABZ some day), but not come to anything yet.

I do wonder what will happen if/when BE & other locos increasingly start competing on routes that T3 fly.

Or maybe it won't come to that, as T3 are primarily focused on business, & maybe there are just not enough leisure pax to attract locos onto T3 routes, or possibly the markets if there is demand will remain separate markets.

I am a fan of T3 - they are a good & shrewd operator & I am sure they would adapt if change was required.

I believe this was some sort of agreement between T3 + BE, allowing BE to have NWI-EDI, and T3 to have NWI-ABZ

Err I think you find that those J41's have actually gone home to mummy where they were intially made ie British Aerospace.

I would imagine that any increase in numbers of J41's on the British register will have come from the US from the desert. They will have a raft of Engineering changes to be made before they are fit for use in the UK. E.g TCAS fitted, Cockpit doors, BRNav and also any special stuff just for eastern eg a galley.

The fitting of the cockpit door would be a complete bitch with major structural changes which the line maintence hangers available arn't equiped to do.

Re RT's question - he is in fact corrrect and the facility at PIK is a T3 facility and not BAE, staffed by T3 engineers. Here, the J41 a/c returning from the states are as described stripped down and rebuilt as well as being put through all the various avionics mods required (EGPWS/TCAS etc). Cabins are completely re-furbished, fitted with T3's all-leather seating and as stated galleys are added at the rear (I understand that in the U.S. these a/c operated in 30-seat config with no galley facilities as opposed to T3's 29-seat fit).
Of the 3 remaining J31/2 a/c - I beleive the oldest (G-ys) is now stored at HUY with VC/VD alternating on the Wick/Stornoway as described. These 2 will also be stored from the end of Feb when Wick/Stornoway becomes J41, making the fleet around 25 J41s and 4 S2000's.
Of the Jetstreams - generally 3 are tactical spares while 2 or 3 are on maintenance checks in the HUY hangars, though it seems the oldest BACX aircraft will soon start being returned as the 'new' aircraft come online, and the cancellation of NCL-LCY will I presume release a unit.
The Saabs - constantly rumours this will be increased by 2 or 3 aircraft this year

Cheers for the Info Tightturnaround :ok: . Makes you wonder why they can't source other Aircraft that don't need all that modifications done. Guess
its down to cost ,J41s are probably cheaper than any other Turboprops in the UK with that seat configuration

I wouldn't say that needing a heap of mods is particular to J41's when older aircraft are getting put onto the British reg.

Especially if they have been in the desert for a few years. I should imagine the cabins will be in a pretty poor condition.

And a fleet of 25 is over a quarter of the whole production run.

J41's have a reputation for being quite fast little ships, reasonably reliable and don't use much fuel. And as with all BAE products built like a brick :mad: house.

Is the sim up and running yet?

They should look closer to home and route the MME-BRU route via HUY and launch Humberside to Copenhagen, Esbjerg and Paris CDG.

Regards

Mike

One suspects they've already thought of that.

Oh, and a HUY-Southampton would'nt go a miss either!

Regards

Mike

What about MME - Bournemouth?

a) They don't serve Bournemouth
b) They already fly NCL-SOU and LBA-SOU

Just 2 reasons why they won't start MME-BOH :ugh: