Have to agree. Looks like the domestic routes are doing well for EZY
Will probably be fairly even in winter with the lost of EI but with BHX and extra flights to MAN and EDI coming on stream
Still disappointed that EZY have not put on any extra London flights
SEN is great news, 8.5 K pax in April and has steadily gone up to over 14K per month for August. Have to admit it is my preferred London airport now

EXTRA FLIGHT TO LUTON S13
 

They have an extra flight to Luton from next year. ;)

Is that an extra daily flight or 1 extra weekly flight?

I think the extra flight to Luton is only on a Friday

Yep every Firday and Gatwick is on the cards too and a few others...and Jet2 have stuff on the cards too.

What plans do jet2 have? Possibly ema?

Please enlighten what plans

Anyone hear anything about a possible BA move to BFS ?

Been hearing a few whispers.

Around the time of the protracted EI saga, they were definitely talking to one and other but I never heard anything that sounded like a possibility. Thought it would be dead in the water with all the recent public announcments of their commitment to belfast and their praise for BHD, but I suppose stranger things have happened. Would they split the base?

BA have always talked about the Belfast route / service. Switching airports and it will still be Belfast.

Personally I hope they do switch to BFS as it would mean a later flight arrival froh LHR

BA and BFS
 

I am sure BA has negotiated a good deal with BHD and it would be difficult for BFS to offer something which would tempt BA to shift in the near future.
BA had been talking to BHD re moving there (in a bid to cut losses) prior to 9/11 when the decision was taken to pull out altogether .

BHD is more convenient for the majority of point to point business traffic ,particularly LONDON based travellers who tend to pay the highest fares and I believe BA would be at a disadvantage to EI if they moved to BFS and EI were at BHD.

As regards flight timings ,this is a red herring.
When BA operated to BFS previously, the latest dep from LHR was 1900hrs.
The latest dep to BHD in S13 IS 2005hrs ,i don-t think wnything later is required.

There will always be someone wanting a flight at 2300hr or 0100hrs because of their individual circumstances , but the bulk of high yield point to point, don-t want late flights.

The BA Shuttle schedule to BFS originally had evening deps at 1630,1830 and 2030. The 2030 was by far the weakest service for business travellers.They want too finish their meeting in LON and get back to lhr and to Belfast at a reasonable hour .

AIRPORT66
 

The last flight from lhr with bmi was always full and mostly buisness men through the week so demand for late flight back would still be there as for ba talking to bfs they have been and always will to keep the cheap landing deals going.

Problem with BA moving to BFS is that 1st they would want an airbridge which they already have at BHD and BFS management would really have to improve their business lounge product as it is no where near BA standard

BCALBOY
 

Not true.
There was a late flight on Fridays. Always very busy too.

AIRPORT66
 

The lounge and airbridge are the least of bfs worries they did offer ei and in the past bmi an airbridge there challenge is getting them there one of the advantages is ba could reduce number of flights and put any size of aircraft on the route then.

BA BFS
 

Srry chaps , but I beg to differ.

The 1989 BA Shuttle schedule to BFS was 7/day ( 6 on Sats).
LHR/BFS 0830,1030,1230,1430,1630,1830,2030. (no 2030 on day6)
BFS/LHR 0715,1030.1230,1430,1630,1830,2030 (no 2030 day 6)

Due to loses on the route and the particulary abysmal performance of the 2030 service from BFS to LHR , a revised schedule was introduced.

W96/7 SCHEDULE
LHR/BFS 0830 ( not sun),1030,1300,1500,1705,1900.
BFS/LHR 0700(M-F) ,0815 (sa,su),1030,1300,1500,1700,1900(not sat)

This revised schedule reduced flying by c 14%.
It allowed the 2030 BFS/LHR to be scrapped.
The afternoon revised afternoon schedule meant BA operated 30mins in advance of the BD dep. on the 4 flts with potential to pick up businessmen on fleible tickets who arrived earlier. (BA/BD both optd fm BFS at this stage).

The 2100 dep on Fri was introduced later . Fri from LHR was always the busiest day and there was enough traffic to get a decent load at least on LHR/BFS sector but it was mainly lower yielding VFR traffic going home to BFS for the weekend.

It has been said both of this forum and others that you can-t judge the profitability of a flight by the loads.Yield is the critical factor.

Both carriers to a greater or lesser degree used Inventory Management to direct the low yield traffic to the weaker flights.The 2120 LHR/BFS on BD may have had ok loads ,particularly when BA withdrew the 2030 ,but it wasn-t high yield traffic

The best BA service LHR/BFS was the 0830 with Mainland based business travellers going to N.I. The 1700 was good.The 2030 when it operated
was towards the bottom if not the bottom.
Fm BFS the first dep in the morning was 1st or 2nd altho it also carried a lot of psgrs connecting transatlantic and the prorates pulled the average yield down.The 1700 was good with the mainland based business traffic returning altho again it was a good connector for the evening flts to OZ/FAR EAST/S.AFRICA . The 2030 BFS/LHR was the worst segment with loads of 30-40 psgrs not uncommon. ( eception being Sun nights with the weekend VFR returning for work on Mon).

I suppose they could reduce it from 7/8 flights from BHD to 3/4 B767 flights from BFS like I think they do from Glasgow

BA timetable
 

I recall arriving several times in the 80's on the last Friday night inbound BA from LHR (B757's often with BaC1-11 as the back up) to find we parked up at the international gates. The reason was that the aircraft then operated a holiday charter over night to, I think, Faro. it weas back to operate back to LHR in the morning. Good use of resources. I think BD did the same thing from time to time

A business route needs frequency, that's why BA have so many A319s at Heathrow.

Air Europa S13
 

Not sure this has been posted...

Not bad times this year, But only running for less than a mouth-
7 May 2013 - 21 May 2013

*Every Tuesday*

BFS-PMI
15:35-19:25


PMI-BFS
12:45-14:45


*FOR TOM (Thomson Airways)*