If you removed Ryanair and Easyjet movements I think variety of remaining operators is still good. There is always something unusual and adhoc to see each day, particularly on Northside. It's just mentally filtering them out from all the usual stuff, which in the "old" days didn't need filtering. Airports in the UK have aircraft which are regulars to them but can be very rare elsewhere. Where else would you see two or three Eos and Maxjets on the ground at the same time, and for that matter nearly 40 Ryanair B738's (albeit between midnight and 6am!).

Hey

I agree, there are a awful lot of FR and EZY flights, but Sat 1 often has a nice mix. Eos, Maxjet, FCA, Thomsonfly, SkyEurope, CSA, Norweigen AS, Monarch, Thomas Cook and a few adhoc charters, now the summer is coming keep you eyes peeled, there will be plenty of unusual things for STN, Maybe even the Balkan 154 again on Saturday afternoons.

BT

Why don't MAN and STN swop for a month!;)

We fed up with TOM, FCA, XL, MON, TCX, MYT and we would love to see EZY and more FR at the airport!

ok....mufc,trust me you DO NOT want to see mickair turning up at your airport.Mattcam.........GET OUT MORE OFTEN!!!!!!!!

and now for something completely different.Not so long ago everyone was slagging circusair for messing up on the Airmedditeranean,well,now that Aviance have the contract,yes you know where this is going, the foul-ups continue unabated.The question is..........WHO LEFT THE INBOUND BIN OF BAGS ON THE A/C WHICH DEPARTED AND HAD TO RETURN TO STANSTED SHORTLY AFTERWARDS!! Ooooops bet someone had to put pen to paper. Just a rumour of course,probably no truth whatsoever...NOT!!!!!

the silence is deafening!!!!!!!

Well im sure it was some pikey ditch sleeping hippie:rolleyes:, and really since when has cirusair ever messed up ??? ;)

"ok....mufc,trust me you DO NOT want to see mickair turning up at your airport"

No, much better have chavjet eh sat1? ;)

Maxjet
 

I was talking to a friend today who says Maxjet have some big
plans for STN in the next 4 months,
with 3 or 4 new routes and based crew at STN.
can anyone add anything to this ??

Maxjet are indeed to open a crew base at STN. Its more efficient than basing small nos of crew at the various US cities they serve.

They are launching on the UK stock market to raise money for expansion, and Dubai/India have been rumoured as new routes. For this of course they would need a UK AOC like Zoom, so don't expect those destinations too soon.

Since this seems to echo the plans of Silverjet, my gut feeling is that a merger of some kind further down the line wouldn't be a great surprise.

Dulles Back
 

The Dulles is back after a winter break and news of new routes from Maxjet.
Hmm cant rule out something happening between Silver Jet and Maxjet but its a good one to watch.
Does anyone know how the new GSM route is going?
API on all flights to Spain, oh what fun. Are FR going to open more desks 3hrs before STD just to do the API or is that wishful thinking. Scrum in Zone F highly possible.

An aircraft flap was found on the runway today, :eek: Airfield Ops have instructed all companies to check round their aircraft.

BAA flight-tracking
 

The BAA website has today started flight tracking.
using web track.:ok:

Air Asia X
 

I was looking on the Air Asia website today and noticed that
they have a link ( Now everyone can fly Xtra long),
If you follow the link is shows routes and says comming this year 2007
48 cities, 8 countries, Europe STANSTED, BERLIN, MOSCOW, PARIS, PRAUGE, no mention or MANCHESTER, this is all shown on a route map
along with the new A330 aircraft in AirAsisX colours,

So do we take it that STANSTED is the UK route ?

As we see with many airlines, until the plane lands on Stansted's runway, rely on nothing!

Fire alarm at STN
 

Has anyone got any more information on the fire alarm at STN this morning. Pretty much all departing flights delayed by at least an hour? Ryanair website says flights delayed due to fire alarm in the main terminal.

Whole terminal evac! Was caused by some welding smoke going into the air con and hey presto the s**t hits the fan

New route for MaxJet
 

Starting on 30/08/07 STN-LAX. Four weekly.

what a lovely smell it was at first thought good old alba has burnt the toast again , least got an hour off work,pity the pax dont move fast enough when u tell them to move.

22 Baggage Handlers Arrested at Stansted
 

Im sure that I heard on Anglia news today that 52 ramp rats at STN have been arrested on suspicion of theft from passengers luggage. Firstly I would like to ask if anybody knows if this is true and whether or not it was a recent operation and secondly did the agents bat for the orange side or the blue side or a mixture of both. If this is true then the implications must be heavy on the handling agents, as theft from passengers must be an instant dismissal offence not to mention the amount of section 18 searches Essex Police must be doing as I write.

The number quoted in this story is 22. Not as many but still a significant number.

http://www.eadt.co.uk/content/eadt/n...A51%3A45%3A577

I did think 52 seemed a hell of a lot, still as you say j.o a significant number of folks. 22 must be around 2 shifts worth that are now enjoying the fun of custody food or getting a handsome £80 slap in the wallet and dismissal.!!
I suppose the full background checks were carried out to see if the persons involved had Pre-convictions for similar offences prior to being allowed access to 1000s of un guarded passenger items a day.????? I think probarbly not.!

22 is indeed a large number to be arrested. Although perhaps so many in one swoop is primarily tactical - UK society seems to tolerate arrests on the basis that they know more important suspects, and it is for the common good that they should not be allowed to tip off their colleagues or otherwise taint a police operation. Gone seem to be the days when "helping the police with their enquiries" could be achieved without being arrested, and when "false arrest" might have been a problem to the authorities.

It's quite conceivable that there are always one or two bad eggs in an airport this size ... and even 22 is surely a small proportion of the total doing this kind of job?

Still a big number though. And it would no doubt include some team leaders?

Personally I've long since ceased to check-in valuables, or lock bags. I've also seen them opened too easily (by customs inspectors). Instead I wonder what other perhaps more important duties of trust/care placed with the same teams/team leaders might be in danger of being abused daily...

Let's not fool ourselves ... lower cost operations can so easily translate directly to higher risk of employing dross ...

22 arrested doesnt mean 22 guilty.

What ever the background checks made, the employers can only go on the checkable evidence provided to them, they pass that on to the BAA who would have made their own checks and then decided who passed the required standards to be eligible for the appropriate security clearance.

I know pilots/atcos and other "professionals" who have convictions for a wide range offences, but although declared vis security protocols, it hasn't precluded them from gaining airside access.

Just because someone is arrested it doesnt mean that they should be hung drawn and quartered by Burn and his his friends in their balck & white world, before the facts are proven.

IMHO, if they can steal things from the luggage, what things can they add to the luggage?

If theses guys are searched going into a sterile area why the Hell aren't they searched on the way back out again? Beats resourcing security to taking toothpaste off flightcrew.........

Wonder if there will be strikes now in support of the handlers.

I think that this is a bit presumptious lower cost operations are no different from any other company they all use outside companies i.e in STN there is servisair and swissport as there handling agents and I think you will find that also in Heathrow both servisair and swissport are both working there and the airlines operating out of Heathrow are not exactly "lower cost operations" is it just the fact that STN police were merely working on an operation and got lucky.

Black and white world eh NikNak, I am guessing that you may work on the ramp and never been a victim of the nature of crime that these were arrested for.???
You are right to say that even if somebody is arrested it does not make them guilty of the offence they were arrested for, however I feel that the arrests made would have been inteligence lead and not just a lucky shot in the dark.

Burn, I wouldn't pout it past being exactly that, a shot in the dark, at least to a certain extent.

If the police can isolate on shift and/or area where these thefts are occuring then pulling in 22 people is not beyond the realms of possibility in order to catch one. Think about it this way. We (the coppers) have deduced that AT LEAST ONE of these 22 people has been stealing from luggage. Now the chances are they will have some of the loot still hanging around somewhere. If we arrest one or two, and don't get everyone or get the wrong people, then the actual perpetrators will have ample time to get rid of any incriminating evidence. It ain't pleasant for the innocent arrestees, but after the real criminals have been caught the rest will be free to go with no charges brought.
I'm not saying this is the scenario, but just one possible reason for the seemingly large number of arrests.

Old news
 

The articles today are a bit of a rehash of old news. The 22 were actually arrested last December, one of them is finally going to appear in court. This is why the story has been re-gurgitated. The others have either been cleared or are on bail.

http://www.teletext.co.uk/news/regio...n+charged.aspx

I believe the majority of the people arrested are no longer employed by the handler concerned. Also most of them were on the same shift

is the virgin atlantic all-business class airline coming to stansted?

Not Quite on thread, but before joining the ranks of the exalted, did my time on the ground side of things.
This has always happened, and probably always will, possibly of more concern now than ever before, but obviously being addressed.
The point of this post is that in my very early days, I flew with a skipper who had been a baggage handler at a major airport, and his advice was:
'Don't bother with locks or anything, the guys go straight through them. They know how to drop the strongest cases so the locks will spring'
'The only way to dissuade them is a long canvas strap, crisscrossed as if you're wrapping a present, then tied with a couple of knots, free end taped down' 'These guys only have moments to open a bag, check for goodies, reclose it and send it on it's way, so yours should go into the too hard file'
Of course the strap can be cut, but upon arrival at the carousel this will be obvious, localising the incident far more than the thieves would want.
Has worked for me for many years.
Happy Travelling
F88

It always happend, and it might be discovered nowadays because of more stringent security measures everywhere but especially in the bags handling zones.

ssshhhhhh......alledgedly Servisair are talking 'bowt it right now

The latter angle is exactly what I meant. Servisair and Swissport are lower cost operations, are they not? They were formed or reformed as lower cost outfits in response to pressures exerted by lower cost aircraft operators (which surely is more or less all aircraft operators thesedays?).

Interesting they seem only to have pinned something on one individual. I doubt there was sufficient record-keeping to pin bags or flights to individual handlers ...

Is it still true that they are more or less directed casually to where bags happen to need moving from one moment to the next? Who supervises who in the hold? Are there places airside but off-camera where stolen items could be stored until heat is off?

I heard have heard of habitually displaced toilet ceiling tiles in the past ... even heard a 'joking' story of a baggage handler seen returning airside with a bag across his shoulders: "Where do you think you are going with that?" "Dunno, I was sitting on the toilet and it fell on me!"

As others say, it's being going on for years. It wasn't known as 'Thiefrow' for nothing.

Weren't baggage handlers banned from wearing Leatherman type tools for this very reason?

We had this problem with my company in the East as well, especially in the bulk hold 5 until we fitted some cam corders and caught them red handed. It was amazing to watch how deftly they could open a suitcase and frisk it.

JNB and NBO are rife with this kind of thing. Even been filmed in the act. Usual defence is denial followed by threats of industrial action.:hmm::rolleyes:

Before I started on the ramp I heard from a lot of people that baggage handlers were out and out thieves. Granted I haven't been doing it long, but I have never seen or heard anything which would lead me to believe that anyone was stealing from peoples luggage.

I hope this person is punished to the full extent of the law.

What I'd like to know is, why aren't these people ground baggage handlers or even cleaners searched before leaving airside too??? This way they cannot leave with anything more than they came in with. Security can be tightened much more at airports. It would be easy to figure if someone was stealing form bags or the airvraft or not. Why would a cleaner have a laptop or 3 mobile phones on their duty? same for baggage staff???

Maybe this should be introduced accross the board at airports.