I always find it totally amazing how Dublin seems to have such a massive failure when they get the slightest gust of wind. I'm originally from the North Coast and we get significantly higher winds than this - think 60/70mph several times a winter and life goes on.
Belfast airport never seems to shut down because of wind and I'm pretty sure the wind will be higher there.
Derry also managed to have all it's Ryanair flights operating as normal today.

It's a little odd I have to say. 40 mph gusts are nothing to me, they really don't suggest a total shutdown of an entire airport.

DUB is extremely busy and it only takes a few abort/go arounds to mess things up and have a knock on effect.

Majority of the time BFS has decent gaps between movements and a few go arounds wouldnt cause much delay.

Yes but Belfast isn't closed down.

DUB hasn't shutdown. There have been go arounds but they are determined by the aircraft type and airline.

Wind Shear was a major issue combined wind speeds changing every minute, many pilots got a reading and were lining up to depart and and when they requested a final check it was outside limits.

There was not a single time since yesterday where winds were in any way constant.

OwenC the fact Belfast doesn't have the sea next door helps a lot...

Just noticed three Ryanair planes haven't even attempted to land at Dublin, their gone straight to Shannon.
At the same time two AerLingus planes have landed on first attempt.
Is it that the B737 has tighter restrictions than the A320? Or something different?

Ryanair have a 30kt crosswind limit for landing when the runway is wet,and a 25kt crosswind limit for take off.

There have been no Ryanair departures from Dublin all day due to the constant strong winds,this has led to all the stands being occupied on terminal one.There was quite a long wait this morning for the three aircraft that managed to land, due to all stands being occupied at terminal one.

You get a situation where you can land but have a long wait on the taxiway while waiting for a stand to become available.

I presume that those aircraft that diverted to Shannon thought that the wind would have died down somewhat and the Ryanair's would start taking off again leaving stands free,but it seems Desmond had different plans...

FR cancelled around 150 flights since yesterday evening up to 30,000 passengers affected, first flights today from STN arrived a few minutes ago with a BHX inbound but diverting (majority of pax didn't show up). One more STN in and one due to depart if possible. Quiet a 24h for FR.

Rwy 28 rarely matches up with the prevailing south westerly winds on this island, unlike say runway 24 in SNN. BFS has 4 runways at 90 degree intervals, perfect for rough weather situations, unlike DUB's 4 which are not suited to strong south westerly winds at all.

BFS is the most useful airport on the island for diversions due to it's runway layout, and they always pitch in and help out.

Runway directions.
 

Could never understand why they didn't build the runway in a South West direction in the 1980's or why Cork's main runway 17/35 was built at almost 90 degrees to the prevailing winds in the early 1960's. Let's hope they don't make the same mistakes if they build a new runway at Dublin in the next few years.

If they build a new runway at Dublin it's almost inevitably going to be parallel to the existing one. Otherwise, why build one at all?

I recall flying into Dublin over 25 years ago and landing on the old runway 23 while they were building the then new 28 and thinking to myself that it was a short sighted plan to close 23.

Then again, I thought closing 23 at Heathrow was also short sighted, but the lack of a cross runway hasn't affected it as much as at Dublin.

AA to fly B777 instead of B763 to ORD for some or all of summer 2016 according to regional director of Ireland. Travel Extra reports, likely 772 given the number compared to B773, both 260 or 310 up from 210 currently.

If true hopefully it will improve their OTP, because it's pathetic normally!

AA doesn't operate the 77L, I guess you meant 77E? The 77Ws are used on prestige and high capacity routes so I agree you won't see that.

Quite an amazing upgrade anyway!

Yes just spotted that mow, Thanks!

oh my that's so exciting! I'm off to Chicago this summer and I've been looking at airlines. I was set on Aer Lingus business class but if American are coming with a 777 i'll be certain to go with them.


Will the flights be loaded?

Short sighted aviation policy in Dublin? Surely not....

Runways too short and in the wrong directions, new terminal built in pretty much the only location where it can never be expanded (and too close to Rwy 28 to boot), and then the real gem, the taxiways.

T2 can be expanded both air side and land side.

And build another cul de sac, one of the few good things about the current layout is aircraft pushing back on the eastern end can go back far enough to allow arrivals pass in front while they start up. That would go with eastward expansion. 1 in, 1 out really slows down movements