I've operated the NQY-SEN route on the Dash before quite a significant number of times and there were no issues with holding or extended routing. At the time Flybe were operating into LGW and the SEN flights were not much longer.

....it'll be a bit slower on an ATR though than your speedy Dash!

Well not really, if pilots operate the Dash to SOPs then they'll be flying fuel efficiency and cost index speeds, these speeds equate to not much faster than the ATR, maybe just in the climb.

The point of the PSO is to promote access, so frequency is more important than the total number of seats.

quite.

but I don’t think that there’s anything saying all four rotations under the pso have to go into the same airport ?


cs

They seem to add 10 minutes onto the published flight time when the ATR is operating the IOM to BHX route rather than the Q400, mind you we were spoilt last summer having the 175 on the route

The Dash is normally filed for around 50kts faster than the ATR on any flight plans.

When I was a captain on the Dash 8 we were filed at cost index speed (usually around 210kts). I have a photo of an old plog right here on my phone.

COI was always based on the fuel price in MAN which depended on how much fuel u uplifted elsewhere if it was cheaper or more expensive. Weirdly BHD was cheaper a lot of the year. When we did the BHD-EXT-CDG we would regularly get crew take 4500kgs to do all 4 sectors

Sky News reporting flyBe is trying to secure a rescue deal to 'prevent its collapse'.

link to article: https://news.sky.com/story/regional-...lapse-11907407

Yikes... though if you were going to predict anyone now to go under... Had thought slightly more stable now with VS.

Begs the questions why on earth would VS/Stobart get involved in the first place. Surely they would've had vision of the potential for this to happen. Unless the plan to pick the carcass for their own benefit? It was always too much for VS to solely make use of for connectivity.

Administrators put on standby.

Is Flybe now controlled by the Connect Consortium or is it still controlled economically wise by Flybe itself?

Very strange unless there is more to this let flybe to go in to administration and stobart/vs pickup what they want from it, as what happed to bmi regional and loganair

I believe it is now controlled by the Connect Consortium. I think the consortium bought the assets of Flybe, rather than the company Flybe plc as was originally planned. Though, they couldn't exercise any management control over Flybe until the takeover was approved by the European Commission.

https://connect-airways.com/gb/home.html

I know a lot of staff at Flybe will be watching but let’s just hope something can be done for them.

It’s controlled by the consortium now. They put a Virgin executive in charge and Christine Ourmieres Widener left.

My two thoughts are: could the private equity firm which went in, and owns the largest stake, now have cold feet and trying to stall the investment by making the conditions tougher for Flybe to meet. Or, they want to let it go under, allowing them to pick the decent parts and escape paying redundancies and lease termination clauses.

If Flybe goes under, it does a lot of damage to Virgin’s claims to want to be the 2nd flag carrier and to get the slots on any new runway at LHR.

Bizarre how this message gets to the media if Virgin and the new owners have serious long term plans for Flybe. Surely the liquidity needs of the business were put into place?

Sadly news like this whether true or not will do little to encourage forward bookings.

The implications for any such developments would have dire consequences for many stakeholders, in particular the staff, but also airports such as BHD, SOU, and NQY where Flybe comprise the majority of flights.
​​

Also IOM, but Stobart operate the Flybe flights from there at the moment (50% at the moment, soon 100%)

SEN
 

Incidentally, BHD SEN and new SEN routes to Scotland do not seem to be in the Flybe app, are these cancelled? I don't remember reading about that ... maybe a blip

Apologies Flyerguy, of course IOM and others too...

What will happen with the stobart air flights if flybe do go under? will they still operate or would they have to stop?

Stobart no doubt are a separate company. Cyrus own shares in both.

The ones they operate for Flybe will probably stop.

Blue Islands will carry on.

Can't quite get my head around this... I thought this was done and dusted...

https://www.cityam.com/troubled-airl...funding-talks/

This is a very sad state of affairs. However I have a question which I know will possibly generate healthy debate.

With social media being so much more advanced and customer reaction so sensitive, do the media and their response to such “breaking news” items put the final nail in the coffin? If there was a restriction that would not allow such negative journalism at such times would this make any difference? I ask only because of the sheer volume of customer queries on twitter and Facebook and the unnecessary comments from, what would seem to be, self proclaimed armchair financial experts citing every personal issue with Flybe as their reason for financial difficulty.

I appreciate that the public have the right to know what happens in the country but I do wonder if restrictions may just enable some breathing space?

Look forward to everyone’s thoughts particularly those close to business failures in the past.

If a big four accountancy firm has been put on standby, then the situation is really rather serious - it's not simply some minor problem being amplified. Any financial problems are likely due to long term issues, rather than some sudden unforeseen event. Senior management of the companies involved should have been well aware of the developing situation for months, not days.

Having reporting restrictions removes a great deal of the credibility afforded to established news organisations and would likely do huge long term damage to UK plc.

Also, as a consumer, do you not have a right to know that you could be about to lose your money?

Having been through the Thomas Cook debacle, I really feel for everyone involved. Some who have only just got jobs with them after being made redundant from Thomas Cook!

A lot of talk over the last couple of weeks of the non-appearance of NQY-LHR which was due to be put back on sale last week. Though on an equal basis it’s not clear why a continuity PSO route couldn’t have been put on sale with the rest of the routes.

Also it’s been highlighted here about the future running of the airline given there are effectively two HQs. And that one of the stated objectives was to develop a stronger SEN network.

Perhaps I’m being optimistic but maybe an administration is to ditch the Exeter HQ and more easily get out of any routes and leases that are surplus to requirements, run the whole thing from Dublin. This is no consolation to the staff affected but would at least salvage some jobs rather than an all-out collapse.

There are one or two things that point to this - eg the NQY PSO issue (getting it transferred to the new entity or switched to SEN rather than re-tendering) and that there is quite an expanded SEN schedule which would otherwise compete with themselves at LCY

A big worry in my area with airports EXT and SOU if Flybe go under - SOU will have no one left basically

Nor will a few other places

To take a recent example of mine I had two BHX-HAM flights booked before they canned the route. It took five weeks to sort out replacements as they wanted me to fly to HAJ and were willing to pay for transfers/trains to HAM etc. In the end they conceded and booked LH BHX-MUC-HAM which I had looked at and was £180 return (I had paid Flybe £160 per return). When I received the booking details the two flights had been booked as flexi economy fares at £490 per return.

So a £360 transaction had been rebooked at £980 (loss of £620), take the many passengers being rebooked on all of the cancelled flights and multiply them by this ineptitude shows why they probably need finance - lets not even talk about loss of goodwill/confidence going forward.

AirportPlanner1 makes a very good point - suspicious that the LHR-NQY flights are not on-sale. I think they know exactly what they are doing and have done all along. Stobart want Flybe EXT HQ to go bust and then everything can be moved under Stobart in Dublin effectively 'saving the day'. Terribly cunning if this is the case.

I'm guessing BA would pick up NQY LHR if it came with slots and PSO?

I believe the NQY slots are BA's anyway.

If they are having to rebook you they can only rebook you on flights that have availability and in the same cabin you booked in. If that means a £980 fare on another airline then that's what they have to go with. It's probably why they initially offered you the train option, which would have been considerably cheaper for Flybe.

Like I said, LH was showing £180 return online for economy, instead they rebooked me on flexi fares of £490. My Flybe fare was non refundable economy.

So who is brave enough to book Flybe flights for the summer? I would rather travel to another airport than take a chance they will be still around.