Virgin Holidays is going to be renamed Virgin Atlantic Holidays and close 15% of there retail stores.
They have not stated they are withdrawing all the B747 fleet as some posts have reported.
They have stated as follows, It will no longer use all of its seven 747s, with four A330s retiring in early 2022 as planned.
The way l read it, they are not going to use all seven, but an unknown number for a period of time.

I guess they bank on the waiver being extended or they lease them out.

See what you mean, poorly worded as it can be read both ways.

Full press release here:

Virgin Atlantic positions itself for post-Covid19 future

SWBKCB, Yes l agree, gives them a little wiggle room in there plans.

Also from the press release:

As Virgin Atlantic aims to establish itself as the sustainability leader, it will fly only wide-body, twin-engine aircraft from London Heathrow and Manchester to the most popular destinations.

Suggests that sadly the game is up for B744 fleet.

More important than fleet mix, I have friends and ex-colleagues at VS and send best wishes to all at Virgin on such a tough day. I fear many others of us in the industry will be facing tough times in the weeks and months ahead

Current fleet according to Jethros is 4 x A330-200
10 x A330-300
4 x A350-1000
7 x B747-400
17 x B787-900 Total 42 frames.

According to the press release there will be 36 twins left for 2022, currently 8x A350-900, and 14 x A330-900 on order, even with the B747s and A330 200 going thats still a few too many.

Is there any indication on when Virgin plan to extract operations from LGW?

The A330-900's will replace the current -300's. Of the A330-900 order 8 were from Airbus & 6 from ACL, so wouldn't be surprised if the ACL order gets cancelled. That still leaves 37 even without the 6 ACL aircraft.

4 current 351's (plus 8) together with 10 current 333's (plus 14 NEO) comes to a total of 36.

Single fleet ops while avoiding breaks to contracts has to be the way forward..

I note that a test booking on Virgin's website still allows me to buy a ticket on 28 May for a Gatwick - Antigua flight. I don't imagine this flight will actually go ahead anyway, but when were Virgin thinking of zero'ing out seat availability, or have they not actually decided *when* they will end flying at Gatwick ? The need for staff consultation under England/Wales employment law prior to redundancies suggests to me that staff based at LGW will remain on the payroll for a while yet

What about the 17 787's?

As I say, single fleet ops. As in A330 & A350 only. Just my hunch.

VS official twitter account responded to a customer this morning saying as of 5th May all 7 747’s will be retired.

The four A330's retiring in 2022 I guess will be the ex LTU -200 ones? They do not have RR engines.
Virgin have just completed a nice cabin refurb on them although they are getting elderly as an air frame.

The fleet for 2021 should be
17 B789
10 A333
4 A35K plus 3 due for delivery. Msn 071 (G-VDOT), msn415 (G-VTEA), msn426 (G-VRNB),
That leaves 2 unaccounted for if they are thinking of a fleet of 36.

do you think thwy will still operate the seasonal GLA MCO or will that be binned

Nothing mentioned so guess we will have to wait and see but as they were operated by Manchester aircraft it is possible

They have stated that the 332s won’t be leaving until 2022. So it’s possible A/C 35 and 36 may be 2x A332s

I believe MCO - GLA/BFS do well so I doubt it unless they move away from ‘ beach fleet’ completely which I doubt.

May turn out that LHR get a few ‘beach’ destinations but I wouldn’t be surprised if MAN picked up a ANU or similar so I would guess that if they had the spare capacity for a position to GLA/BFS then onto MCO and back then they would. Not out the question but so far they have only mentioned ditching LGW

Virgin can't make a statement about the removal of the B747s, without making it clear, (ie It will no longer use all of its seven 747s), it would have been much clearer if they removed the words "use all".
It is no wonder that they had the application for government aid turned down, if that's the best use of English that they have.:ugh: