FBO schmeffBO. What Prestwick needs is another secret war so they get loads of lucrative rendition flights. Could generate a nice local trade in Scottish-built shackles and tartan "eyeshades".

Hello S.O.E - I'm not windsock but I can't resist a challenge. I've always assumed a Skipness 1 E was a SID from either egpk or egpf, but I don't know for sure. Am I anywhere near the truth?

Is it the name of a kangaroo ? Good news SLF.... Well said Lnida. Onwards and upwards for GPA

Willy that's exactly it, a good educated guess from the chap from er....London. Reminds me of where I came from, it was a Prestwick SID.
btw LNIDA is Norwegian and likely not actually a girl called Linda.....though I can't be sure.

I thought Ocean Sky went bust? Did they continue trading?

Ocean Sky became RSS which now becomes Landmark. There was no cessation of business. And still the aeroplanes flow in, C17 just landed, G650 on approach, Lear Jet to follow !

Thats what they all say Skippy. Lnida / Linda . It doesnt matter..

S.O.E - I've lived in South East England for a very long time but I was brought up in the West of Scotland so I know of Skipness - it was, I think, a VOR in my day. No idea if it still is, or even if its still there. However guessing that SOE was a SID was not too difficult - it had to be that or a STAR and I don't think PIK and GLA have STARS (but I could be wrong about that).

Willy, work your way through this page.:p

NATS | AIS - Home

Rgds
AyrTC

What a great page, and I have learnt that GLA does indeed have STARs, but not, it would appear, PIK. Cheers.

On a clear night prestwick has a few STARS

Jeez. Everyone take a pill.

Skipness and Machrihanish were the main 2 SID`s used by PIK for Transatlantic flights back in the day.
Most people on here - and I include Honest Man, who I have known for years, are like myself, passionate about the place and want to see it do well again. Absolutely nothing wrong with that.
I work in the airport, and I can assure whoever the poster was who said "no one outside Ayrshire wants to use the airport" is talking utter drivel - like many other anti-PIK posters on here.
Day in day out, travelers from Aberdeen, Dundee, Edinburgh, Glasgow(yes whisper it), Newcastle and Manchester, to name but a few, are using PIK because......... the price is right. And if PIK can manage to attract some other business and the price is right, then people will choose PIK.

Good to be passionate, Tiger8, but as a taxpayer do you really want your Government using your money to manipulate the free market in the use of Scottish airports, to artificially decide who flies from where?
Remember that GLA and EDI are privately run airports that compete in an open market for traffic (that's airlines and passengers). PIK, INV, and DND are in public ownership and shouldn't compete to take people away from privately run enterprises using our money.
PIK and the others have to stand on their own two feet, unless they have an essential component to their operation. Surely the question with PIK and DND is how much should the taxpayer be expected to contribute each month to win business that would otherwise automatically default to GLA and EDI?

Shouldn't we leave the passengers to decide?

Answers to your MSP...

If PIK is to succeed surely it has to find a reason to exist beyond a cheaper alternative to GLA for the LCCs.

Tiger 8 is bang on the money, you have to get the price right and you cannot compete on quality of product. PIK surfed the loco bubble which has now gone pop quite loudly, making the airport entitely dependent on one ruthless operator. I don't mean that as a crticism of FR, it's just their modus operandi.

One thing you will not be allowed to do at the taxpayers expense is compete on cost in a commercial fight with GLA. That is absolutely not what taxpayers money is for, lining the pockets of MOL and helping a bust business at PIK harm a struggling but viable one at GLA. This could yet end up in court.

Speaking of VORs, anyone else remember when the TRN was actually the more apt PWK? (Or are they seperate?)

@ Willy Wombat
Prestwick does have a STAR - it's page AD 2-EGPK-7-1 in the AIP. It's not often referred to by Prestwick Approach though - mostly only when their radar's out of service - usually a more expeditious radar routeing will be given.

I stand corrected.

willy w - apologies if it sounded as though I was having a dig at you personally. As a former PK ATCO, I thought I'd just set the record straight. I have to say your posts are among the sensible ones in a thread that seems to have attracted much nonsense of late :rolleyes:

No offence taken.

Another USP bites the dust?

BBC News - Airbus A380 'super jumbo' lands in Scotland for first time

Apparently PIK is no longer the only airport in Scotland which can handle a big aeroplane. Which does rather beg the question "Why would anyone bother trying to save it?"

Yawn. :ugh::ugh::ugh:

Depends what you mean by a 'big aeroplane'. And I'm sure you will get the responses that you intended to provoke.