£300m versus £15m, mmm let me think. There will be no holding off a start and as I have mentioned previous, materials are on order and work shall commence once delivered. This small project (in comparison) is NOT dependant on any possible future recession/major interest rate rises et al!

Yes, thanks TCAS,
the 757 can outperform almost anything as I am sure you know -
A fabulous aircraft - would still be ideal for SOU today too...
I think Monarch's also flew in and out of SOU + Hispania's too >? (not 100% on that one - sorry)

I worked for many years with the 757 with Monarch, Air Europe and Air Europa's, Britannia, Odyssey/Nationair, Hispania and IEA (a lovely little outfit)
Load it up 228-235 seats - fly to Palma or Alicante and back twice during the day, then off to the Maldives or Mombasa in the evening.

Thomsons' filled it from SOU - the market is still there I am sure.
Palmair had no issues filling 757's from BOH too - TFS PMI plus Luxor and Cairo day trips.
A frequent aircraft used also at EXT for IT's.

The other week when I Landed back at SOU with BA on a Saturday evening I have never seen so many Jets on the ramp or taxying at Southampton.

6 or 7 BA EMB's -
the KLM EMB and a couple of Eastern and Loganair EMB's
plus 2 or 3 (of the larger?) ATR Turboprops of the Channel Islands guys.

Incredible actually.

I believe that the Azzura A320 calls were only on two occasions and not affiliated with any of the tour operators at the time. I can't remember off hand what year they visited Southampton but there's a photo online of one at the airport.

Rog
Spanair also operated to other Spanish airports other than Tenerife.

Here's a general overview of what we've seen at Southampton Airport over the years with regular flights by the following.

Air Berlin operated Boeing 737-800 to Paderborn, Germany
Air Europa operated Boeing 737-300/400 to various Spanish destination's on behalf of Thomson
Air Malta operated Boeing 737-300 to Malta on behalf of Newmarket HolidaysAustrian Airlines A319/320 to Innsbruck on behalf of Ingham's
BH Air operated A320 to Varna, Bulgaria on behalf of Balkan Holidays
Futura "occasionally" operated Boeing 737-300 on behalf of Thomson to Palma
​​​​​​Iberojet and later Evelop operated A320s into Southampton on behalf of Thomson.

There was a Portuguese airline using a Boeing 737-300 to Faro, Portugal operating on behalf of Thomson for one season and I'm thinking that it was around 1999/2000. It could well have been EuroAtlantic Airways.

​​​​​​And of course the previous and regular visits of TUI Boeing 737, 757s and the current A319/320 from easyJet and way back in 1981 regular weekly Caravelle flights to Palma by Transeuropa.

You've already mentioned the Centennial, Oasis and Spanair MD83s in 1998 and the Volotea A319 and Boeing 717.

​​​​​​

The Portuguese airline using a Boeing 737-300 to Faro, Portugal was iirc SATA (Azores)
and Thomsons used mainly the Air Europa 737-400 for quite a while.
Yes Spanair also did PMI and IBZ I recall 2004 A320's and MD-83.
Iberoworld with the A320 from 2004 (became Evelop and now Iberojet!)
I saw Iberworld's A320 depart and land on 02 - not a common occurrence, as the wind is usual in the other direction.

SOU 02 threshold

Azzura A320 first visit of this aircraft to Eastleigh in 2003
Austrian Arrows and Tyrolean CRJ-200's were seen 2006 - on INN or SZG summer charters>?

So the mainstay has always really been the 737-200/300 and 400
plus the A320 and 757.
Now the EMB Jets rule along with some A319/A320.

Golden Oldies at SOU
As an aside I have just seen some nice photos of BMA C-4 Argonauts at Eastleigh 1966/67 on charters, plus Air Ferry DC-4 and DC-6 and BUA and Cambrian 1-11's.
Transavia Caravelles and 737-200's seem to frequent too.
Seen at SOU Aerolineas Argentinas Boeing 727-287 LV-MIM leased by Lineas Aereas Canaries for summer 1988.

I take it that your refering to the Air Britain website and the excellent Barry Friend catalogue of nostalgic photos taken at Southampton. They are indeed a treasure trove of photos and I do remember several of them from my youthful plane spotting days. Barry Friend the main author of those photos also has an excellent collection of photos amongst others on the BCAL nostalgia website at www.british-caledonian.com

Considering historically the routes on offer it does make you wonder why EZY haven't tried a few sun routes over the summer months at some point? A PMI, IBZ or a Malaga 2-3 times a week etc.

If anything is tried post extension, your suggestion seems the most plausible from European bases

I guess a small issue of the Pandemic for 3 seasons - aircraft all parked up and crews furloughed or left...plus Grant Shapps' debacle of Will we - or Won't we go on holiday?
EZY is not in great shape this year for all of those reasons and more airport problems in 2022, and so I really doubt they are anyway interested right now.
I reckon we will see 2024 as more convivial - I concur with SKOJB above

BA's summer sun routes were in the bag and planned pre-pandemic and they decided to still ''go for it'' last summer 2021 with limited success -
This year they came back - It seems so far to be very happy camping for them at SOU....
They are back for 2023 adding Florence and Nice.

So is that small extension to the runway really going to make a big difference? As read here, SOU has a history of jet aircraft flying to European hot spots. The proposed new length still means many routes will still be off limits.

Those routes started earlier in this Summer season, but didn't last long (in case you didn't know)

I saw that there was a football charter the other week using a CRJ-900. Whilst I’m sure it wasn’t fully loaded, I didn’t know they could operate from SOU. Anyone know if this is the first time one has been in?

Cheers,
I know they were on sale - but did they actually start ? -
Back in May, I was about to book FLR for next month and it disappeared off sale the next day! I was fuming lol

Re BCAF NCE and FLR summer 2022....Wycombe

Re the Footie charter CRJ-900 the other week - was it the Iberia one due >?

If so, it ended up operating in and out of Bournemouth.

Good to see BACF returning for S23 with a similar schedule to this year and as mentioned above, FLR and NCE return, it all points to loads and yields doing ok!

CRJ700 performance for SOU is OK but you can carry fewer passengers on a 900 than you can a 700. Basically you’ve got the same stopping power for a heavier aircraft so the payload is more limiting.

the Iberia flights used a CRJ-1000 and operated out of Hurn. The Global Reach aviation CRJ-900 operated the flights out of Southampton

I believe they did both start but only ran for a few weeks (please correct me if anyone else knows better)

After having a quick browse of the CAA statistics for June, SOU seems to be behind compared to other airports. Whilst having different carriers at the airport can be a good thing, I feel that Loganair and Eastern just don't have enough brand presence to really get a higher throughput of passengers through the doors.

Flybe Base
 

Judging by the timings Flybe are to base a Q400 at Southampton from 02/03 operating the following flights:

Edinburgh - 7 weekly
Glasgow - 7 weekly
Manchester - 12 weekly (1x Sat/Sun)

Belfast City continues 7 weekly.

Hopefully a more reliable operator for the Manchester route than Eastern (and more chances of interlining options from there?), and the Scottish routes aren't timed well for business travel, but scooping up some of the leisure and vfr market may lead to Loganair offering a few more lower fares up there. One daily flight to each is hopefully a nice boost to capacity without dumping, at least for now...