Quite - in his rush to look at the position of CTA (and giddily report it is not there) he has obviously not bothered to look elsewhere.

In any case, at this stage pretty much everything will be subject to change.

Ukraine international route pushed back to 2020 now...

https://www.kyivpost.com/business/ui...ive-years.html

ET have applied for two daily transit slots at LGW with a 787-8. Looks like that is the object of their desire for expansion with no similar signs at MAN.

Assuming that is accurate, agreed. The interview above did not specify "Non-London"...

Re the Ukraine International deferment to 2020 above...

Ryanair have just signed an agreement (again) to commence ops from Boryspil & Lviv in the Autumn.

Destinations will be announced in Feb or March...So perhaps perhaps.

Well fingers crossed Manchester features once again. It did the first time round so assume it could do this time around.

Hmm rubbish times ?

Rubbish times for enthusiasts? LY have a couple of flights from Europe around the same times so must work for them

IMO, the prospects of ET launching a ADD-MAN service are limited to the possibility of a transit route as with Dublin and now possibly with LGW.

Frankly as a reasonably frequent user of ET flights, from my personal experience they would want to focus on getting their load factors up first. The last time I did ET701 from LHR I was one of five people in the huge Business cabin of an A350. Down the back was far from full. Great from a pax perspective but awful for yields.

I've read plenty of nonsense on here over the years from armchair experts professing to know how this connection or that level of demand would justify a ADD-MAN route. Ethiopian Airlines are pretty good really but I can tell you that Bole Int Airport in Addis is far from being a great place to connect. Their geo-political position also puts them up against the ME4 for UK- points east and south.

If you look at the 'smaller' ET destinations in Europe apart from the above mentioned - they feed to and from *A hubs. MAN is not a *A hub.

Anecdotally of course,, but I was chatting to the Cabin Service Director on another ET flight saying how much I would prefer a direct Manchester flight. Her response? 'Where is that exactly?'
Sorry for the reality check.

I'm not saying Manchester is some kind of global Mecca, but the fact she apparently doesn't know where Manchester is probably explains why she is a cabin services director.

Latest Acl ElAl canx all slots no more held by Ly. And the Fr route is PMO Palermo not CTA.

Interestingly LOT have been added back into the slots from Sept.

I’m not sure what’s going on with LY, and I still feel a little more time is needed to clarify the picture.

Granted, they have handed slots back, but, just this week the flights were added to the Tel Aviv website timetable.
Then there was an article about LY starting SFO and the CEO stated MAN was indeed starting this year.

Perhaps a winter start is in order?

What's that supposed to mean exactly? That all cabin crew are only cabin crew because they're stupid?

Actually very few people around the world would've heard of Manchester, the place is completely irrelevant on a global scale. And the majority of those that have heard of it would only be due to football.

Don't be mean, he's from Leeds! :E

Touché! :)

Unfortunately due to a certain event last May, I’m finding that quite a lot of people know where Manchester is. I’m not suggesting for one second it’s a good thing, but on my world travels, many do indeed know where Manchester is.

Manchester, MAN, and the region it serves is obviously not New York, London or Paris. Equally it is not a backwater, and there are plenty of reasons why a person may have heard of a region, one of which you have identified.

Quite frankly, I'd expect anyone with any say in a major airline's management teams, including its route planning and commercial teams, to have heard of Manchester. I would not hold cabin crew to the same standard - and it would be unreasonable to do so because it isn't their job.

EL ALAMO and the sLOTs
 

The Return of the Israeli flag carrier is beginning to rival the story of El Al-amo in its twists and turns. Hopefully we'll see the flag waving in the distance at some stage.

Good to hear that the LOT slots (unlike their namesake's wife) have not looked backwards and turned into a pillar of salt, and yet may add a little seasoning to our late summer visitors.

Wonderful roverman! I was merely going to comment that I was relieved the LOT slots were not LO(s)T. However, your biblical reference and analogy may escape some but far surpasses my effort.

easyjet:

I believe there are one or two on here who like to plot schedules for carriers like easyjet, Ryanair and Jet2 to see how many based a/c they indicate and what gaps there may be.

Having had a go at easy jet for the early departure wave in peak summer from their web site, I was disappointed at what I came up with. It could well be that I've missed some but the most based a/c I found were 12 on certain days and 11 on others, rather than the 13 I thought had been confirmed (irrespective of any further expansion).

Just wondered if anyone else had looked at the schedules and if so what you found.