The dribble out of Aer Lingus' Winter timetable continues. There are now three flights a week to Alicante rather than the two, which had been showing previously...

Does anyone know if Air Malta will be returning this summer? If not, will any charter operators have flights to Malta?

In relation to the EI winter program rumours are they will increase the TFS service and also introduce MAD to their increasing number of destinations, I presume the stories of the 4th overnighting aircraft not staying in cork for the winter are false. This is not the first time EI have looked at MAD as a destination however atc slots and handling difficulties hampered the plans and MAD was dropped ... hope this is true cause Madrid is a great city and has great South and Latin American connxs

Ryan2000
 

The Aerlingus schedule also allows for a UK destination on the days that the aircraft doesn't go to Birmingham i.e Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.

Shannon Hand outs
 

The SFADCO HANDOUTS to the airport have been going on for years, rumours of promotional materials being printed for airlines etc , fuel deals...
Pity someone would not write a letter to IrishTimes or get dail question asked about the legality of State Aids to airports.
yours etc
Name and address witheld

Cork TDs please copy

[quote=asianfly]I
To help sweeten this bitter pill, the Minister for Enterprise Trade and Employment has told Shannon Development to hand over €6m per year for the next five years to Shannon Airport.

This €30m State handout will subsidise its losses and mask its real financial performance.

Asianfly can you refer me to the source of the quote on the 30 million?
Strong possibility that this is not legal in terms of European State Aid rules.

Westcorkman - apologies but don't know the identity of the reporter who authored that report in the Sunday Independent. Their online edition does not provide the author's name, so you will have to refer to the print version.

Some news about the cardiff game on the front of the echo today, I'd say the airport is going to be jam packed - Can't wait!
http://eecho.ie/pdf/front.pdf

Latest list:
These are all provisinal times as slots and parking have to be confirmed at all airports.

CORK 20th May
MON8038P STA0700 STD 0800 MON8038 A300
RE423 OVERNIGHT STD 0555 ATR42
MON8020P STA 0730 STD 0830 767 MON8020
FJE912P STA0730 STD0830 767-200 FLYET
BE082P STA0740 BE8003 STD 0820 RJ100
CRL040 STA0745 STD 0930 CRL 841 747-400
G-ORJA STD0800 BE200
VLM883P STA0915 VLM883 STD1000 FK50
G-WVIP STA0930 STD 1000 BE200
MPJ999P STA0950 STD 1050 MPJ 999 MD83 AVIAJET
VLM884 STA2135 VLM884F STD 2200
BE8004 STA2205 STD2235 RJ100
MON8039 STA2225 STD 2325 A300
MON 8021 STA2255 STD2355 767
FJE913 STA2310 STD 0010 767
CRL 842 STA2340 STD 0405 747

SHANNON
Friday 19th
Astreus 757 STD 0935 RETURN SAT 2300 757-200
AVIAJET STD1050 RETURN SAT 2350 MD83
JET AIRWAYS 757-200 RETURN SUNDAY TBA
Saturday 20th
CRL 747-300 STD0900 RETURN 2230 SAT
DBV MD83 STD 0600 RETURN 2200 SAT
BMI A320 STD 0830 RETURN 2300 SAT
AIR GREENLAND A330 STD 0900 RETURN SAT 2300
DBV MD83 TBA??
JET AIR 757-200 TBA?
FCA A320 TBA??
Source: CorkSpotter

Looks like ORK will be pretty busy on the 20th! No sign of the MON A330 tho:{

Does any one know if SN will operate to BRU again this summer? From what I can remember things went pretty well last summer? I assume that most of the Buget Travel charter flights are operated by Futura, but does any one know about the Falcon/JWT? Please not eirJet!

Also what the hell is going on with STN this summer? two daily flights? FRs yield in August is amazing, most weekend flights are already more than €100+tax one way(+baggage as well:eek: ), and we all know that FRs taxes add up to a pretty penny!:ugh: I travelled a lot to STN last summer, and the flights were always packed.

Red eye departures from Cork.
 

Heard that staff at Cork have been told that the early morning departures i.e 0145 will be operating on 6 nights per week shortly. So presumably the 3 per week WIZZ flight to Katowice will not be the only new eastern european route. WIZZ also have a base at Gdansk and the original press release mentioned two new routes.

It's quite a long story...

In the Autumn, they informally told the travel trade in Belgium that they would be. However, after that the merger process with Virgin Express started. SN took over rotations on a number of TV's routes and in the process acaled back on a number of their own. Unfortunately, Cork seems to have been one of the routes affected.

I had hoped that TV might have taken on the route as it was regarded as more of a leisure route. However, that doesn't seem to have happened.

In the mean time, direct trains from Schiphol to Brussels take about 2 1/2 hours...

Yes, it is a pity the BRU was lost for this summer season. Three a week would have sold easily enough. Ideal really for the SN Brussels RJs.

There are a few tiny signs that the new gang above at Cork are at last beginning to apply themselves to business. For example, as the Mrs and I disembarked off last night's jammed EI845 from AMS there were no less that 4 (!) bizjets on the ground at Cork! It was either a fluke or is it a signal that corporate aircraft operators are being courted again to return to Cork and are getting a warm welcome rather than being shunned away to Kerry and the midwest airports.

There may yet be quite a fly in the ointment for the rugby flights on 20th May. There is a rumor that the IAA will only allow Cork turnaround one wideboy at a time for the match in spite of there now being about five widebodies expected early on the Saturday morning!

Maybe, at a great push two big aircraft may be allowed to turn around together? Hard to see pax being brought in at 3 am or 4 am in the morning for the flights either as the ramp will be all ready fairly full at the hour with the overnighters and along with whatever contractual arrangements have been entered into between the travel operators and the likes of Monarch etc, etc.

The solution is plain - close runway 25/07 for a few hours in the airport's interest as well as in the national interest? An Air Atlanta Boeing 747 has previously parked overnight on Cork's short runway and pax were bussed to her next morning for a game in France some years ago. The cargo facilities of DHL and TNT are also being lined up for the processing of the outbound supporters to the aircraft.

It will be very interesting to see how the airport copes with all this traffic. I have heard a rumor that Serviceair will be very short of despatchers for the morning and big time coaxing will be needed to get extra folk in from elsewhere to work the flights. You know, it has to be made work really as the airport with a new management team and a new terminal will be extremely exposed to mass public ridicule if any stunts are tried to shaft Cork passengers so hopefully the IAA will go a little easy this time with Cork.

There is precedent in that the processing of so many pax at Cork Airport for the previous final in Cardiff in 2002 worked and the problems were mainly at the Cardiff Airport end. Let us hope it turns out well as it would be a dream start for the new Cork management in terms of publicity and goodwill. My advice to Cork Airport in the handling of this big match day operation is to again keep her friends close and her enemies even closer - Bigi Ullamh as they say in the Scouts!

Rugby match
 

Cork handled 4 widebody's including 3 747's on the 24th May 2002. There can be no excuse for the sort of drivel which Tour operators had to listen to last week.

What's the point in spending 200 million euro on infrastructural improvements if Cork cannot cope with this challenge.

What purpose is runway 25/07 serving at this stage? The only airline to use it on any sort of a regular basis (Air Wales) have withdrawn from Cork.

None of the other airlines apart from rare landings by Aer Arann will even consider using it in crosswinds.

There's plenty room out there for aircraft parking. Why can't the 767's park nose in by the new terminal. Let the A300 and 747 use the stand to the north of DHL/TNT

Sorry to break into the rugby talk for a sec - what's the feasibility of extending 07/25 westward (possibility on stilts like - I think - Madeira) to max weight A321/B738 size?

MarkD

With the roads and houses at both sides I dont think it would be feasible. Extending 35 could work as there is sum land at the back and it wouldn't be too hard to move the road slightly.... Will it ever happen though. I doubt it :(

hafez - I wasn't thinking eastward because of the road (big problem!) and the big developments around the Douglas-Carrigaline corridor but I thought westward was a bit more sparse.

Runway 25
 

Westward extension is very feasable. In fact development has been restricted to allow for a future extension. However I wouldn't hold my breath given the current financial position at Cork.

This falls into the realm of things I was told by a taxi driver rather than things I have through and reasonable source, but anyway...

The new access road to the airport dips significantly near the entrance before rising to meet the roundabout. Quite a lot of earth was moved to create the apparently unnecessary dip. [So far it's true ;-)]

What the taxi driver said was that this had been done so that the level of the Kinsale Road could be dropped and 07/25 extended eastwards over the Kinsale Road.

Incidentally, I have taken off from that runway in a 737-500.

Seemed to be an unusually high level of bizjet activity over the weekend - anyone know why? Was it the same a/c all the time or more than one?