So Covid restrictions aside, is an airline with 60-70 aircraft based in the UK simply going to be allowed to continue on an Irish AOC under EASA when other operators have gone to the trouble of Creating UK subsidiaries to continue their UK based operations. If this is the case then what was the point of leaving EASA and what is the point of rebuilding the CAA?

As an EU airline, they are allowed to operate betweeen the EU and the UK. What they can't do is operate withing the UK or from the UK to non-EU countries.

I doubt many will get to travel without some sort of restrictions in the next few months. Then it will be a case of rebooking and paying the large difference in price.

SWBKCB
I have had another look at the agreement and yes, it does look like that. It looks like business as usual in many ways so nothing to stop other EU carriers opening bases here, pushing existing struggling UK carriers closer to the brink and generally undermining the UK resident pilot market. There will not be much left for the CAA to regulate soon other than UK domestic.

This isn't really the issue you might suppose. Very few carriers of size are purely UK-owned these days. British Airways is a division of multinational IAG. TUI is a pan-European company ultimately owned in Germany. Ryanair UK, EasyJet (UK), Wizz Air UK are all divisions of pan-European companies. Virgin, Jet2 and Loganair are (AFAIK) predominantly UK-owned. Aurigny and Blue Islands are Channel Isles. Eastern, Titan, Jota, 2Excel and Skybus I presume to be UK-owned too. But in terms of fleet numbers and crew, all of those added together don't come close to the size of those large multinational companies. The principal UK freight carriers are mainly multinational operations as well. Most of those familiar 'struggling UK carriers' are in reality 'struggling multinational carriers' already.

biddedout

Right :rolleyes:

Like Ryanair is going to get rid of its Pilots that are British just because they are British.

RK/RUK prefix & "Blue Max" c/sign evidenced pm operating STN-OSL with an Irish registered a/c.

An interesting choice of call-sign.

The movie "The Blue Max" was made in Ireland so that might be part of the puzzle.

G-RUKA flying the "BlueMax" STN/OSL today.

Money talks. I know people who vowed never to fly FR again, then did because they were by far the cheapest.

As with most products many people will "buy" the price & not the product.

It isn't only the price. As a large chap I but an extra leg room seat and flight them because they often go where I want to go - Carcasonne for example.

Another few toys out of the pram:

https://www.routesonline.com/news/29...ith-regulator/

Interestingly even in COVID, with Brexit looming earlier last year there was talk of opening a base in Gatwick. HORD seemed to indicate he could put 16 aircraft, and the latest on the grapevine is it could be announced later in January. Not sure when flights would start, but with RYR losing aircraft next year it would be interesting to see if they do open it to get ready for a recovery while deals are getting cheaper at airports.

davidjohnson6

I have had an issue with them recently where I was booked to fly to Faro on 21 Dec. On 20 Dec Portugal barred UK nationals from entry along with the majority of other European countries and others around the world. I therefore did not travel. I emailed Ryanair twice about this as their online chat wasn't responding, had no reply. I also tried to call but gave up, imagining they would be pretty inundated with other passengers asking similar question about their tickets they were unable to use.

I got to speak to their call centre a couple of days ago, and was basically told , the flight left and there was nothing they could do. They didn't want to know, I kind of expected , but its awful to feel you are being fleeced . My hire car at Faro and Parking at Liverpool Airport was all resolved very quickly on the plus side.

Ryanair expects 95% fall in passenger numbers until April.
Reported in The Guardian today.

CEO stating today initial roll out of the `8200 will be into the UK market.

If that is the case, then each new UK frame will be a Blue Max.
Now it all makes sense!
Ok, Blue & White...

DUB all airlines only 384 departures in the next 7 days! Anyone flying into DUB from UK or SA needs a negative Covid test taken within 72 hours of arrival. Arrive without a test and you can get a €2,500 fine or 6 months in prison. Soon other countries. Who is going to book? I've had 12 recent cancellations and await refunds / vouchers. Will I book for Spring / Summer? No way and perhaps others think that way.
Look at UK airports MAN next 7 days only 320 departures, STN 303 departures, GLA 119 deps, EDI 156 and of all those flights how many pax?
I don't think you'll see any FR flights from UK soon. Its how they will weather the storm.