I suppose "too close to HKG" is a matter of perspective.

It's easier to land in Newcastle when your destination is London, than it is to land in Hong Kong when your destination is Guangzhou.

Agreed with the comment that China Southern would work better but unclear the domestic politics of that.

A quick Google search reveals that there are high speed trains from Hong Kong to Guangzhou that take less than an hour meanwhile the fastest trains from Newcastle to London are around 3 hours. How did you come to that conclusion?

There's a fairly long border control process (the queue stretched for about half a km when I was in Hong Kong) that you'd want to leave plenty of time for. However, you can get a ferry to the mainland from Hong Kong airport without entering Hong Kong via the SkyPier.

Indeed and to state the obvious, to use the high speed train route you have to clear Hong Kong immigration twice.

There's also a transfer from HKIA to Kowloon allowing time for the connection.

I've done it on the old train in about 5 hours so I guess you could do it on the new one in about 4.

Not dissimilar to landing in Newcastle to get to London.

Of course the airfare to HKG would probably be rather higher, so you would likely be paying a pretty penny to insert a fairly complex additional transit.

Not great for people who would want to save money, people with small children, people with lots of luggage, people in a hurry or those wanting to maximise predictability.

To add to this, you're not going to suddenly get off the high speed train in Guangzhou and walk straight into your house. Other trains & buses will be needed to complete the journey. Guangzhou City & it's suburbs are very vast. Take for instance a commute from one part of Beijing to the other can take up to two hours depending upon the time of day. Another 1 to 2 hours commute maybe needed to reach your final destination after arriving in central Guangzhou.

Manchester City pre-season tour flight cancelled due to being refused airspace. Apparently a Thomas Cook admin error. A costly one at that. Does anyone know how that could happen?

https://www.manchestereveningnews.co...elled-16581159

Managerless Newcastle United departed no problem on the CX flt though!:D

Man City flight cancelled again to Shanghai. Someone somewhere at Thomas Cook must be getting a roasting. Man City will be absolutely furious. Pre season tours are big business. With the launch of their new sponsor Puma and their new kits this is deeply embarrassing.
https://www.manchestereveningnews.co...elled-16583958

Where does TCX actually get involved as the aircraft is Nexus Airlines of South Africa, did TCX do all the planning or did Nexus?
as there is no mention of TCX anywhere

There's many news sources reporting a Thomas Cook clerical error failed to book a slot with air traffic controllers. Thomas Cook must be chartering the aircraft from Nexus because Thomas Cook is Man City's travel agent. Maybe next time they will use Etihad. They're their main sponsor after all. It's absolute balls up. I wouldn't be surprised if Thomas Cook will have to shell out some compensation for this.

With Thomas Cook Sport being the travel agent/charter broker for Man City, the responsibility for planning the flight with all the various permissions and overflight clearances will usually rest with the operator, which is Aeronexus.

I suspect the error may actually rest with Aeronexus.

Well the Aero Nexus 767 ZS-NEX only made it as far as Abu Dhabi yesterday. The team then picked up an Etihad jet to fly to Shanghai or Nanjing. The Nexus jet obviously failed to get clearance to fly through Chinese airspace. Man City are due to play in Nanjing on Wednesday evening.

https://www.thenational.ae/uae/etiha...light-1.886695

Anyone know where one of the TUI maxes has moved to? Sure I could only see 4

Thanks

Apparently moved to a hangar.

Update #99 courtesy of the MANTP Team

Part1

https://i.ibb.co/d0nD0CS/Screenshot-666.png

https://i.ibb.co/sRFbSgm/Screenshot-667.png

https://i.ibb.co/wcgdftH/Screenshot-668.png

https://i.ibb.co/b2pFG4q/Screenshot-669.png

https://i.ibb.co/zQWtYZL/Screenshot-670.png

https://i.ibb.co/yg6gdQc/Screenshot-671.png

https://i.ibb.co/3dQRdXK/Screenshot-672.png

https://i.ibb.co/n69KHvk/Screenshot-673.png

Part 2


https://i.ibb.co/bQcwcjR/Screenshot-674.png

https://i.ibb.co/rv8bmsW/Screenshot-675.png

https://i.ibb.co/vVVrHXW/Screenshot-676.png

https://i.ibb.co/znVQNgs/Screenshot-677.png

https://i.ibb.co/wQ10qJ4/Screenshot-678.png

https://i.ibb.co/ZHT2BVN/Screenshot-679.png

https://i.ibb.co/LdstXtr/Screenshot-680.png

I understand the slots for AZ and Anisec have now been cancelled.

Escalators, Lifts and Travellators
 

Since this is now in the public domain I thought I would post this which is taken from the Minutes of the Annual Meeting of the Manchester Airport Consultative Committee meeting on 12th April 2019

Members had also expressed disappointment that no permanent fix was imminent for the leaking roof over the Skylink and that the walkways were difficult to repair as they were old and it was hard to obtain replacement parts.

Brad Miller explained that both of these issues had also been raised by airlines. The walkways were also of non standard design which meant parts were difficult to source. Both items would be part of a medium – long term review but there would be no immediate fix.

I had separately written to the Chief Operating Officer and the following is part of the response received:

"As you are aware, the majority of the travellators at Manchester Airport, are aging assets which, need maintaining on a more regular basis. We are currently revising the holding for long lead time items with a view to minimising asset downtime. This review extends beyond the Skylink and covers all lifts, escalator and travellator assets with any stock being held on site at Manchester.

The elevators closest to the GTI have been out of action due to exceptional circumstances. Both lifts in this area were out of service due to a local power station being flooded, which affected the power supply. Whilst one of the elevators was reinstated very quickly the other suffered a power board failure during the outage, and I am happy to report that this lift has now subsequently been returned to service."

Hopefully we will see improvements over the coming months - although this will not be a quick fix.


These out of service escalators and travellators require replacement of core drive components which have a long non-UK manufacture lead time.

These assets form part of a remediation plan that is now live and will span from June-October 2019. Our facilities management team are continually addressing the leak issue within the Skylink area however, until all leaks are identified, and the areas repaired, the capturing of water will remain in the interest of passenger and visitor safety. Whilst we appreciate the appearance may not be appealing on the eye it is only a temporary measure and is being constantly reviewed.