This investment would have been planned months ago and hence don't see how this can be pinned on the MD

Rivet Joint

LPV explained here:

https://www.thebalance.com/localizer...pproach-282711


Great advance over ILS, no expensive equipment to buy/maintain and does not need the recurring expense of having to flight check it every six months.

The only expenditure required is a obstacle survey, which is checked annually (already needed to sustain other instrument approach procedures and the EASA Aerodrome Certification) and paying someone to design the procedure and get it approved by CAA. Last time I was quoted for one was less than £50K.

Just remember if you read that link we do not have WAAS in Europe - so EGNOS would be used instead.

This morning's KLM requested an RNAV approach but was advised it was now NOTAM'd as not available until March 8th.

Sounds like win win. Begs the question why the bigger airports stick with ILS though?

On a separate note, what's going on at SOU today? Obviously the whether is extreme at the moment but the likes of Doncaster and Newquay seem to be open yet SOU is closed. Lack of equipment to clear the snow? Can't imagine it has been hit as bad as the airports in the north.

The snow has been particularly bad for SOU and BOH meaning the runways couldn’t be cleared fast enough before another’s layer covered them. Also freezing rain affected the southern most airports like Exeter Bournemouth and Southampton which is even more disastrous than snow and can be deadly. My only criticism is of Exeter and Bournemouth’s social media updates which have been totally disgraceful compared to Southampton and others

Why do you say Southampton is closed! it has been open since 8:30 am this morning.

The Blue island from Guernsey landed at 10am and the Jersey flight was on its way but turned back to Jersey for reasons unknown to me.
Flybe have taken the decision to cancel its flights until 3pm but saying the airport is closed is not true!

ILS has lower minima (including CAT 3 autoland). If the bigger airports relied solely on RNAV approaches then no one would land when visibility went below 1400M or cloud ceiling was below 700’. CAT 1 ILS approaches can be carried out in 550M visibility and 200’ cloud ceiling.

*these figures are an approximation and vary according to location and aircraft/aircrew.

The ability to fly a LPV procedure considerably lowers the OCA, for a CAT C aircraft on runway 02 the OCA is 415 FT. Had the obstacle environment been better (ie no hill or trees) the OCA would have been even lower.

From what I recollect the visibility/RVR minima takes into account many factors, including OCA and the length of approach lighting on the landing runway. I suspect that could result in less than 1400 metres.

See my link in #402

Of which SOU has very little!

Just having a look at the January 18 figures for Easy jet flights

Geneva 4697 passengers

Don't have access to the Flybe loads but taking the following , for example

1 )

Flybe operated 12 flights ( 2 x Sat , 1 x Sun ) average 65 pax per flight
Easy jet operated 13 flights average 121 pax per flight

2 )

Flybe average 75 pax per flight
Easy jet averaged 111 pax per flight

That’s why I said the figures were an approximation.
The question was why do the big airports still rely on ILS: the answer is lower minima.
I’ve yet to see RNAV approaches be certified for LVPs.

Del Prado
The Nats IAIP RNAV chart 02 for SOU clearly shows the LPV approach with the minima OCA as stated by TCAS FAN,therefore it is available ,but not to the 8/3 as stated by Notams.
Clearly a big improvement for landing aircraft at SOU.

Presumably you are talking about EU OPS Low Visibility Operations, ie operations in RVR less than 550 metres, applicable for Lower than CAT 1, CAT 2 etc.

These are not applicable at SOU due to obstacles in the each runway's final approach segment, and a restrictive aerodrome ground lighting system.

What will now become available on 8 March for runway 02 is a quantum leap for SOU.

Adding to this plaudit, well done to the Airside Ops team for getting the runway back into operation following the recent snow, and keeping it operational.

Rivet Joint said “Begs the question why the bigger airports stick with ILS though?”

The answer is lower minima for ILS.

With the greatest respect to other posters, I don’t have to check out SOU approach plates or links to explanations of types of approach or consider the lack of LVPs at SOU.

The question was “why the bigger airports stick with ILS?”

The answer FOR BIGGER AIRPORTS is that the ILS allows operations to continue in marginal weather - in fact right down to 0/0 if aircraft is so equipped and crew are suitably qualified.

Apologies for the lack of Southampton references here but I was simply trying to answer a question from another poster about bigger airfields.

BMIR
 

Just been trying to book flights from SOU-MUC for May but nothing is showing as bookable on the BMI Regional website after 24th March. Is the route stopping?

Wouldn't be a surprise as the route is cancelled more times than it runs!

I hope not, was planning to use it again in the summer. Loads were over half last time I used it. Really will be a case of groundhog day if SOU loses another operator/route. I have noticed they often lend their fleet to Logan and even Eastern lately. Would be better used serving their own routes, but these niche operators seem to want to just be in the wet leasing business now. Look at Cityjet.

Which airline would operate a Brussels route if re-instated? Airport social media recently asking for feedback on viability and with Flybe withdrawing some time ago, maybe someone else is looking at it (BMI? Although if they are pulling out of MUC, would they then jump in to Brussels)

The airport has seen big falls in passenger volumes year on year for the MUC route. Is the airport too close to Heathrow? Is that why it seems to struggle to get above 2m pax per year? It should be at least half of Bristol’s throughput (9m) by now (4.5M)

BMI
 

Would be a shame to see them pull out, until recently the loads seemed fairly good, and inline with the average for the airline. It is a shame to see that the slight reversal we began to see a couple of years ago where other airlines were starting to break into Flybe's dominant position has all but disappeared.

Considering the positives first, Aer Lingus seem to be doing well on the Cork route, with it being better served now now I can ever recall in the past by Aer Arran (last time it was only a seasonal operation?). Likewise KLM have stuck around so for now it seems safe to assume the route meets their expectations. Finally. EZY seem to be off to a reasonable start, but I guess it is too early to properly judge this one for the time being.

On the leisure front Volotea have dropped their scheduled operation, in spite of a considerable reduction of Flybe PMI flights this year.

Leaving aside VLM (was a niche operation at best) and Powdair (considerable airline issues) the 2nd and 3rd busiest carriers (by flights) are now both Flybe franchises (Blue Islands and Eastern), and now BMI are also throwing in the towel! Considering it was on paper a well suited route (small aircraft, twice daily frequency, numerous onward connections on BMI and Lufthansa) could it be the reliability issues and cancellations that caused this, or was it a case of the route under performing and being the first to go any time operational issues came about?

As an extra point I remain intrigued as to whose aircraft Lolo Flights are going to use next year if Flybe are planning on getting rid of the E195's by then...

BMI service ends on the 24/03. A shame and clearly some UK airlines are struggling to survive and make routes profitable, I include Eastern, Cityjet (Eire) and also Flybe in this as well. Me thinks further consolidation beckons!!

More? there won't be anything left!

That is ridiculous. Obviously we are not privy to the yields but surely at their prices, an over 50% erj-145 is making money for them. The recent decrease is probably largely down to the fact it went down to a single rotation. A route like this could become a gold mine with the LH codeshare. When I used it recently there were all sorts of nationalities on the flight. Why ride out the hard times when BE were operating the same route only to throw in the towel? I had high hopes of them opening more routes to Frankfurt, Brussels etc which are all routes which have been served a few times previously. This smacks of them seeing a quick buck in the wet lease market over their bread and butter. You only have to look at cityjet to see where that goes.

or maybe, just maybe, there just isn't the demand at the right price, and it isn't always the airlines sabotaging their own routes?

I thought that BMI to Munich had a LH codeshare.

Is that why two airlines were fighting over it not so long ago? I bet they were making a small amount of money on it but can make more on the wet leasing market. That is a temperamental market though. I doubt you believe that Amsterdam and Paris are the only foreign hubs sustainable from SOU?

It does have a LH codeshare which opened up a big customer base for SOU. Other airports seem to sustain LH affiliates, not sure why SOU cannot.

Regarding your last comment I also find it very strange and also very frustrating.

The catchment area for SOU and a fairly wealthy one at that should be able to support such services but I just can't understand why it doesn't.

The company I work for has seen a huge growth over the last few years with Germany now being our second biggest market WORLDWIDE after the USA with the United Kingdom taking third place as far as market share is concerned.

Although obviously the U.K. Market is the largest from the port the amount of German originating passengers actually joining cruise ships at the Port of Southampton is increasing with the majority of those passengers flying into LHR and catching the cruise shuttle coach to the port.

Having personally spoken to many of those passengers and asking where in Germany they originated it amazes me that SOU can't sustain a few more routes to Germany other than the Flybe Düsseldorf link now that we've lost BMI to Munich.

Eurowings with their Dash8's would be a good addition to SOU offering perhaps a few routes such as Berlin, Cologne, Hamburg, Munich and Stuttgart, some could even be seasonal..but then perhaps it's too close to LHR where they operate from to those destinations.

If it wasn't for the fact that I have a keen interest in the aviation world, living inland by 25 min, I would not of had a clue that I could connect in Munich via a 'Lufthansa' flight from Southampton.

My point is airlines and routes come and go from SOU, and the view on this thread is consistently that it's the airports fault for not investing, or the airlines fault for not advertising, etc, etc

These repeated comings and goings would indicate that the routes that have operated are marginal at best. There maybe one or two odd airline choices, but this seems to be a consistent pattern at SOU. Airlines don't drop profitable routes for no reason.

Maybe the airport just is what it is - it is constrained by its location, and has LHR and LGW on its doorstep.

How dare you bring logic into this thread!:ok:

UK-Germany market enjoys six straight years of growth; flag carriers lead the way, London Heathrow is top airport. An interesting article considering the last couple of days discussion!

How do you explain the growth taking place at "London"Southend? It is pretty much a similar distance away from LHR and LGW but also has LTN and STN to compete with. Not to mention a big part of its catchment being sea! SOU has a place and that's providing a more convenient option for its affluent catchment. There is also a long list of USPs (I posted it a while ago) that create a customer base (being Europe's biggest turnaround cruise port for a start! - that's 2 million customers right there) in my opinion Southend is an example of what happens when investment is forthcoming. Hopefully now the dinasour is out the door we will see a bit of ambition (I will not hold my breath though).

You will only cause yourself angst viewing Southend as a correct model of a market I feel.

1. A cruise ship terminal has nothing to do with whether or not an airport is successful. Cruise ship customers either are coming from London or going to London and simply using SOU as a stepping stone. London doesn’t have its own cruise port. Granted you may get a few fly in/cruise out pax but that would be a tiny fraction of what most people do and where most customers originate. If I took a cruise ship out from Southampton I would certainly not want to be flying back to SOU on a turboprop. I will fly into LHR in style up front with BA. Most of those 2m customers at the cruise terminal are British or American.

2. Take your passion Rivet Joint and try and do something with it. For instance would you sink your own money into an airline at SOU? Would you be willing to put your money where your mouth is and re-mortgage your house for it for example?

3. SEN. Jan 18 CAA stats show that their GLA, DUB and MAN routes only managed 30% load factors. I would say SOU is far more successful than SEN currently and I doubt very much that SEN would be able to sustain anything above 1m pax per year for long without massive advertising spend, shorter train times and closure of LCY

Regarding cruise passengers traveling to Southampton by air as it all depends on where your originating from.

Royal Caribbean Cruises and Celebrity Cruises have a deal with Flybe and most of the weekend cruise departures have a fair amount of passengers connecting to SOU from BFS, GLA and MAN and to a lesser extent EDI to join the ship.

On one weekend last summer for two ships there was over 600 passengers over the Saturday and Sunday connecting with a similar amount flying out, the SOU shuttle to the port was operating every 30 mins with all the coaches full.

Princess Cruises Northern Europe cruises are extremely popular with Americans, Australians, Chinese (huge market) many South Americans, last summer on one particular cruise on the Caribbean Princess to the Baltic we only had 86 British passengers out of a total compliment of 3126, so that that gives a good idea of the demographics.

Obviously American passengers tend to arrive at either LGW or LHR and get the cruise shuttle direct to the port but there are still a lot of passengers who tend to arrive a few days before their cruise and those that opt to stay in the local area before flying home.

Back to the same old point - that isn't the reason airlines stop and start services

Do you really think it is down to one man?

Nakata77

Some good and valid points,except to say SEN have invested heavily in airside development, something we have yet to see todate at SOU,and on recent evidence it's not likely.
Having used SOU a few times over the last few months I would say there is a need to expand arrivals,as queing outside to enter customs is not ideal! Money needs to be spent to expand operations at the airport,if it's not going to fall behind in growth and popularity.

It's interesting, it may be a load of rubbish and the flight is gone for good, but on the other hand I don't recall an airline dropping, or "suspending" a route for that reason before? (I don't mean SOU, I mean anywhere).
I always thought that if a route got dropped the airline would just say they weren't happy with it's performance and be done with it?
There have been a lot of cancellations and delays over the last few months, so maybe there is something in their explanation?
I guess we'll just have to wait and see if they bring it back.