Perhaps as Gatwick is in such dire straits, a change of use to a Cargo centre for someone like Amazon could be more feasible? Two empty hangars, one empty terminal and presumably empty coffers mean you need to get whatever business you can! If Stansted can make it work then why cannot Gatwick?

Aren't they leased from the airport authority?

The land they are built on is on a historical long term land lease. The hanger 6 is owned by BA. BA gave up the original third hanger in 2013.

I think GH6 hangar lease runs out in the early 2030's. BA were holding onto it in the hope of prising some new facilities from BAA / GAL. Not likely at the moment. As to the previous hangars, No1 was the 1-11 hangar which became the MT base, No2 was workshops, No3 was 707 VC10 and latterly DC10, Not sure about the wooden No4 but burned down one night when I was working on the ramp! The other No4 was the Airtours hangar which carried out L1011 and 737 work. No5 was for DC10s. The only one left is No6 the old Laker hangar. OSU had a short stint in No7 after Dan Air and prior to Virgin taking over. there were also various lines of 737 and 757 major maintenance at times. Thats how I recall it since the 70's!

Amazon like areas of high unemployment and low wages. Neither fits the Gatwick area if the airport grows again.

Hangar 7 was the FLS hangar? That went to BA for a time too. I remember DC10s and B747-200s there.

You sure about that? Unemployment seems pretty awful in the area.

Gatwick must be different from Luton then as wages there were being driven down long before Covid by ever lower tenders for contracts. The companies winning the contacts would save money by putting many staff on zero hour part time contracts.

You are correct as usual Skip, Hangar 7 was Dans then FLS then became OSU ( a BA department) then Virgin. :ok:

BALPA have put out a press release about a proposed downsizing by Norwegian at Gatwick. I can’t see an official announcement by Norwegian.

https://www.balpa.org/Media-Centre/P...ownsizing-by-N

I imagine there will be more articles, but this from Norway might give a starting point - consultation taking place over substantially reducing the Gatwick base
https://finansavisen.no/nyheter/luft...-base-i-london
https://e24.no/boers-og-finans/i/LnA...ge-london-base

Update - if you want something in English:
https://www.cityam.com/norwegian-air...ort-haul-base/

Now it is BUT it is the same in many areas. Pre Covid the unemployment rate was low and jobs reasonably plentiful such that employers were struglling for people. In a years time it might be back to it.

Crawley has a huge number of delivery type companies (as well as the Tesco dark site) who send the stuff out and Amazon coming in would take people from there but to compete businesses would up wages so it becomes a fight for higher pay. Little loyalty is not what an employer wants and challenges on pay.

Manor Royal close to Crawley has hundreds of businesses employing thousands, they and airport are major employers PLUS you have Brighton etc all in easy reach.

Following some of the team on Instagram, are Norwegian at Gatwick still self handling with Red Handling? Odd for such a truncated operation, would have expected a 3rd party handler to have been a must with no economies of scale now.

Omniserve are the parent company of red handling, so they themselves are 3rd party. They are also the same company who operate as blue handling at stansted.

DHL are operating the same for EasyJet.

Oh that's really interesting. Thanks.

LGW long haul changes for W20
 

Per the latest Airlineroute updates today, there are a number of changes which will affect LGW long haul operations this winter, mainly:

• Norwegian: Flights to BOS, DEN, LAX, MIA, JFK, MCO and SFO will now not resume in December as originally planned, with resumption now pushed back to 28th March 21. At this time, all other routes to EZE, GIG, AUS, SEA and TPA will continue to be suspended beyond this date.
• Emirates: Resumption of flights to DXB will now not resume in December as originally planned, with resumption now pushed back to 28th March 21. Down to just one daily A380 for S21.
• Cathay Pacific: Daily service to HKG tentatively scheduled to resume from 1st Jan 21. A359 operating.

Do LGW insiders know if GIP/GAL have (tentative) plans to reopen the South Terminal in time for summer 21? Presumably, if and when CX and DI return, they will be accommodated in the North Terminal temporarily before moving back to the South Terminal?

https://www.travelmole.com/news_feat...ews_id=2044725

Travel Mole report on BA at Gatwick.

Bamboo Airways appearing on arrivals board. Not sure the flight is actually operating. I wonder is this something under discussion?

Cathay Pacific
 

Noticed something strange on Cathay's website this morning... Just tried searching for flights from LGW-HKG-DPS in late Jan/early Feb, and flights originating from LGW are coming in noticeably more expensive than the LHR departures, around £200-280 more in economy on the same dates (odd seeing as LHR is the usually the more expensive departure airport). Is this indicating that CX are trying to discourage passengers from flying out of LGW, or even an attempt to price themselves off the route?