The robots have been named Freddie and Laker following a poll of 96 people.

Please note this is a factual post, not another pathetic attempt at humour.

Interesting poll perhaps as very few at SEN under our age Dave would have the foggiest at the association with Sir Fred at SEN & actually with STN too & then only in historical terms.

After saying that I did point out weeks past that it was a mistake to replace the Laker name over the bar with a quite boring generic name.

Possibly that may be one of the first queries of them then...as to why named so?.

Did Laker fly from Southend?

According to your best friend Google..... Laker often flew the aircraft himself. By 1954, Channel Air Bridge, his second airline venture, was flying cars and their owners in Bristol Freighters from Southend Airport (Rochford) to Calais.

Laker the airline didn't, but Freddie Laker was the principal of Channel Air Bridge and Aviation Traders, both based at SEN.

Thanks for the simple civil answer LGS6753.

And let us not forget Freddie's manufacturing enterprises. He didn't just fly Carvairs, he developed them and had a stab at a twin turboprop (The Accountant) all at SEN (I hope I've got my facts right as these are from memory, not google).

Ah, yes 'the Accountant' - definitely ahead of his time again in paying homage to the importance of the bean-counter....

& before my time too...The Aviation Traders Accountant with the first personalised registration G-ATEL.

It always struck me as a nice coincidence that several years later Channel Airways' four new HS748s were registered in normal sequence G-ATEH to G-ATEK so providing a SEN link with the Accountant (and the dark rumours that the 748 was a rip-off of the Accountant).

A second A320neo is due to become SEN-based wef 7th January. The base will then comprise 2 x A320neo and 2 x A319.

I think weight for weight the field performance of the two is similar but the improved fuel efficiency of the neo means that less fuel need be carried on a given sector which allows a corresponding increase in revenue payload. Maybe someone with access to the performance charts can give a more authoritative answer.

Your answer makes perfect sense and falls in line with previous posts in the last year or two which have suggested that gains from the neo will significantly benefit operations at SEN. What I find encouraging is that EZY seemed to have moved quickly in placing two of their finest assets here, rather than use the airport as somewhere where their oldest 319's can see out their days.

It appears to be a not dissimilar story with FR. It's clearly not an easy fit between their 738's and SEN. Yet they have obviously done much work to make their arrival possible, whatever solution they have come up with.

It is surely now the case that both these major airlines have demonstrated that SEN has a solid future that they wish to benefit from.

Makes sense and would fit SOU perfectly once extension completed!

EZY's A319's have derated engines and so they are not actually optimum for the longer routes that EZY are developing from SEN such as the Canaries etc - here the A320 can operate those routes with only a small payload limitation and lower op'g costs - As seen with more A320 ops from SEN...
I assume the Neo can see that payload limit reduced further as mentioned above.

I gather EZY are removing all their A319's venually from the fleet

or conversly have found the airfield so constraining that they have had to deploy their more capable assetts?

Air Malta
 

Sorry, can't post the link at the moment, but it seems it's not just Cagliari in the doldrums but Catania as well. Southend Echo website has the story.