That, I do not know.

Flights up to KEF from IOM have happend before on E jets, so possibly.

I think we islanders need a shot of warm sunshine after all this virus cr*p, I doubt many will want to head to Iceland - stunning as it is.
I wonder if GR are looking at any souhern 'airbridges'?

Maltah as been touted. But I thinkt the biggest problems are;

1) Aurignys E195 performance from Guernsey's short runway. It's going to need to pass through - say Jersey - to also pick up additional passengers and we all know what relationships are like between the Islands down there...

2) It's OK Guernsey having a 'corridor' to say Malta. But if the UK has a corridor there as well for arguments sake, then it takes away the whole safety element of why the corridor exists in the first place.

As a Guernseyman living in Jersey, I think that we can tolerate each other long enough to enjoy a bit of sunshine relief in the Med this summer ! Could be a good, workable idea.

GCI webcam recently shows 3ATR (new ones?) on stand, jet and 2 Dornier ........does anyone know where LERE is?
Pete

GR have done some sun routes before I believe and want to say it was a GCI-JER-MAH Menorca service on Saturdays. I don’t think it lasted particularly long though so maybe worth a second go now. If air fares are set to rise at all then flying from the Islands direct rather than connecting via London or the mainland may be a beneficial option.

You can bet your bottom dollar that, regardless of whatever happens to air fares, the fare for direct flights from the CIs to the Med’ will still be considerably more than flying via Gatwick etc. And, that is even after adding on 2 nights at the Premier Inn !

When they were playing round with HUET the other weekend before she went up to Aberdeen there was an ATR visible at the back of the hanger which I presume was LERE

I thought it was the two "nights" at the Premier Inn being such a problem for many passengers which made the non-stop flights attractive almost regardless of fare?

Yes, that is true. But, for me, it is cynical exploitation on the part of the airlines to charge as much as they do to avoid this problem ! I won’t pay the premium, regardless. But , I understand the feelings of those who do. That is what makes me a “real” Guernseyman !

Or just tight 😉

I often put a value on convenience and time saving so if it costs me more to do something but it is easier and less time consuming than the alternative then I will pay it.

Yes. That is what a “real” Guernseyman is - & proud of it ! I sympathize with your viewpoint, but don’t ask me to ignore my genes.

GCI-IOM Air Bridge:

The Guernsey and Isle of Man governments have agreed to move forward with the planned air bridge , which is expected to be the first established by any governments in the British Isles.

It is planned that Aurigny will operate flights from mid-July for an initial six-week period. An Aurigny spokesperson said they were still firming up the details, but were hoping to operate twice weekly rotations. A full schedule should be released next week.

The decision to form an air bridge follows talks last week between the chief ministers of Guernsey and the Isle of Man, as well as both governments’ Public Health teams.

You could blame open skies - of you were sitting on the Aurigny management side of the fence. But an independent view might raise the various management mistakes made in recent years. The Trislander replacement. The choice of outright purchase of the E195 ( when the more cost efficient CS100 was around the corner ). The purchase of the three new ATRs. The long lease of G-HUET. The setting up of an own handling unit at Gatwick. Pricing strategies. The Blue Island code-share fiasco. The LCY route. Other non-profitable and non-essential routes such as Leeds Bradford, Norwich etc. The competition on the Southampton route, the U-turn on the Jersey route. Need I go on ?

The IoM route - from mid-July to end of August, on a twice weekly ATR rotation, could be actually profitable if the pricing is right and the right days of the week are selected.

Nuweiba, I completely agree with you. The blaming of the “Open Skies” was made very much tongue in cheek. The policy itself is almost a complete nonsense as, since it was introduced, hardly any new routes have opened up & AUR have not really faced much competition - apart from Heathrow, which was always going to be temporary. There simply are not airlines queuing up to operate flights to Guernsey - even with the prospect of a totally unnecessary longer runway. AUR’s problems result from bad management & the fact that they are a Guernsey based airline owned by the Guernsey Government, which values the security of air routes more than it values a profitable airline. AUR don’t have to worry, though. The States will continue to throw money at them.

I think we could say two U turns on the JER route, initially they withdrew, then went back on & then pulled off again. The wrong aircraft was used on this sector, it should have been operated by a (mostly idle) 228 with maybe 2 flights a day in each direction instead of the 1 operated by the ATR.

I'd like to know how much the LGW handling operation costs to run compared to using a handling agent & as I type this I'm thinking the same for GCI too?

Mark Darby was on local radio this morning blaming open skies for Aurigny's losses, one wonders how much longer he can pull the wool over the Governments eyes to hide his (IMO) bad management..?

I think we could say two U turns on the JER route, initially they withdrew, then went back on & then pulled off again. The wrong aircraft was used on this sector, it should have been operated by a (mostly idle) 228 with maybe 2 flights a day in each direction instead of the 1 operated by the ATR.

I'd like to know how much the LGW handling operation costs to run compared to using a handling agent & as I type this I'm thinking the same for GCI too?

Mark Darby was on local radio this morning blaming open skies for Aurigny's losses, one wonders how much longer he can pull the wool over the Governments eyes to hide his (IMO) bad management..?

Blaming 'open skies' is a joke. Open skies arrived and rather than opening new routes Aurigny decided to go into head long competition on two existing routes operated by Blue Islands offering £19.99 fares. Insufficient traffic for two carriers. Sorry Aurigny but you only have yourself to blame for the losses. Also, the shareholders must share some of the blame for a total failure to provide any oversight into what Aurigny was up to. Time for change.

I see they have applied (again) for 56 weekly slots at LHR for winter 2020/21

You mean he wasn't yet blaming COVID ?? :-)

Heathrow, Glasgow, Edinburgh, Southend, Bournemouth, Liverpool, Cardiff.... OK... not all were successful and most will not re-appear after COVID. But probably none of them, with the exception of the Scottish routes, would probably have started up without the Quasi Open Skies policy. Aurigny would have blocked them all and BI would have blocked Bournemouth. And yet those two airlines are infamous for trying compete against each other. And Aurigny themselves, not only entering routes served by BI, also launched routes that competed with and drew traffic from their other routes, i.e. Norwich, Leeds and LCY.

But, at the end of the day, I am very much in favour of a state-owned airline, to protect a jurisdiction's interests, ( just as the harbour and airport is and just as I think a public-sector ferry service would be of benefit ).... it just needs better ( much better ) management. :-(

I expect that once again they won't get them, even though there maybe slots becoming available in the post-Covid era.

If they do get them, I expect they will lose millions. They will once again take traffic away from the Gatwick route, and if they compete once again on the Southampton route, that, in turn will draw traffic from bith Gatwick and Southampton. Airport charges at Heathrow are so much more than Gatwick... and Aurigny have no interline/code-share/jv agreements and that is imperative for both LHR and LCY. Get a jv agreement with BA, and one is talking a different matter : shift all Aurigny booking onto the BA website and have through connections worldwide via Manchester and Heathrow.

Wonder what will happen with the Birmingham route. Will it go ahead, will it replace EMA or will Aurigny try and serve both ?

Nuweiba, once again I have to agree with you - some new routes have resulted from “Open Skies” - I should have specified “viable new routes”. However, I do not think that most of the routes that you quoted are particularly “viable”. At the best, they are summer only routes & operate maybe once or twice a week. The main exception was Heathrow, but that was only a “bookkeeping exercise” by BEE. I suppose that AUR could try & take it up - but that requires the slots. Whether, or not, they could make it work only time would tell. However, there is definitely the demand for this route to justify it being tried. As for the other routes, the opportunity for AUR to operate some of them is there but, they are not money spinners. Can AUR turn them into money makers ? And do they have the aircraft available to operate them ? Time will tell.

Well, if they can keep a LHR route long enough to grandfather the slots, it would be a nice way to polish the balance sheet and to eventually cash in.

And 0 were allocated only applied.

I will miss that Flybe Heathrow connection. Found it so much more convenient for me. I like T2 and usually stayed at the Holiday Inn Express at T4 whereas before I used to use the Hi Express at Croydon when using Aurigny via Gatwick. But it relied on that subsidy from the States to keep it going, as the flights never seem to get ( on average ) over 2/3 full - it seems that when tickets went over the 60 - 70 quid each way mark, there were few takers.

Agreed - last summer I used the Heathrow flight 6 or 7 times as it was really convenient and also Terminal 2 was a joy compared to Gatwick's South Terminal.

A few times on the return flight the loads were in the low 70s but I mainly flew back to the island on Sunday evenings which seemed to be mainly locals who had been in London for the weekend.

According to Isle of Man news, prices for the GCI - IOM will be announced shortly and the booking will be available from Wednesday. I was due to be up in Edinburgh at the start of September but can't see that happening so will probably go up to the Isle of Man for 3 nights for a change of scenery instead.

Interesting Jersey are opening up next week with testing on arrival. BA to resume flights initially to LHR then back to LGW

Have GCI considered this ; seems a shame they have totally cut themselves off ; I know their tourist industry is relatively small

Wow ! Just noticed that the Jersey flights are from LHR ! And from the 3rd July ( when the quarantine is lifted in favour of upon arrival COVID testing ) - I had looked just a couple of days ago and I am sure they were still being shown as from LGW, though from 1st July.

Lucky Jersey :-)

Have just searched further and it seems they will only fly 4 days a week, change back to LGW 1st August and then continue 4 days a week but with twice daily flights.

We haven't cut ourselves off - we have a daily flight to SOU & have done all through lockdown unlike JER, also unlike JER we got the lid on COVID-19 & have no cases - we want to keep it that way too.
An experimental twice daily SOU is soon to begin operated by Aurigny (along with a ferry service from Poole) with pax having to quarantine for 7 days as opposed to 14 as now. We'll see how that goes before opening up further, which I think will be around September. A twice weekly 'air bridge' to COVID free IOM is also due to start soon, this hopefully will bring a few tourists southbound as well as taking 'Guerns' north.

I think the Guernsey approach is justified. We are back to normal here in our Bailiwick Bubble. We can travel between the Islands of the Bailiwick and the rest of the Island economy is running as normal. I can go for a meal, meet friends and family, go shopping and all without social distancing.

People can come in if they self isolate, for example returning to the Island or coming here to work.

I don't want it jeopardised just for the sake of tourists. Why undo all the good work. Our government is supporting the hospitality industry here and so are us locals. Lots of staycations going on at Hotels. Some are fully booked until September. Try and get a table at a restaurant at a few days notice and you will struggle.

I would love to go and see friends and family off Island but until everywhere else gets it under control we are better off keeping restrictions in place. It would be nice to see friends and family off Island but short term pain for long term gain.

Yes, Guernsey has been a shining example to the rest of the country - how it should have been done. Congratulations. Jersey has been less effective, but it is not too far behind. However, with both being small islands it is easier to keep a handle on matters & keep the infection rate low. Just look at Sark & Alderney, where neither had ANY Covid infections.

Anyone know why the E195 has flown to Oxford today?

Doing Oxford - Graz - Oxford before returning to Guernsey.

Apparently it has a few charters lined up over the next month or so.

Suspect that's F1 related?

Possibly - seen that Oxford Airport have tagged a video of the Embraer on the ground there with #F1 and #Silverstone on Twitter

EDIT: Flight numbers were GR11 outbound and GR18 back - that would match with the race numbers for Perez and Stroll (Racing Point)

It's currently on its way to Luton.

Had to divert from GCI due to fog. She is due to do another flight LTN - Graz tomorrow as GR15 which is presumably why she diverted there

GR15 Tomorrow, don't believe any F1 driver is currently using that number.