OpenSkies
 

A lot of people have put in a great deal of hard work to get OpenSkies off the ground. Congratulations on a successful launch an all the best for the future :ok:

Yeah- really well done. Honestly. Fantastic. All the way across the Atlantic. Amazing.

Must be pretty tough to have the financial clout of BA behind you, get given all the aircraft, engineering, training, advertising etc and operate one aircraft.

And to have seats available at the lowest prices only 1 week from now, despite only having 82 to fill. Its a triumph.

I would hardly call 32 passengers (if the papers are to be believed) on the much publicised 1st flight a "success".

32 Pax
 

I believe the first flight is made up of invited guests. You probably wouldn't want to fill the flight to the brim and it would be a bit awkward deciding who to stick at the back?

Wrong. Monday's flight was the non-revenue one. Today's was commercial.

typical pprune and typical english reaction - all queue up to bitch about it, no wonder this county is in such a mess with such negative people in it.

whatever you think of the openskies politics a new UK branded airline can only be good news in these tough times, and like it or not, airlines will be competing on these 'open skies' type routes so why not have some of the business come the UK's way? we certainly need it right now.

I often get the feeling that most people in the uK will only be truly happy when the whole country goes bankrupt, all the business goes elswhere, and then they can sit smugly and say "see, I told you so".
For those knocking this new business - what have you ever done to help UK PLC?

sorry for the abrupt tone, but I'm getting peed off with people continually knocking the entrepeneurs and businessmen that get off their backsides and create the jobs and tax revenue for the very people that moan about it all the time

well said.
 

:DIt is true we seem to love failure so we can bitch away. I wish openskies luck!

wll said
 

757 driver

well said, there is an awful lot of moaning whinging and general negative comment/atitude on PPRUNE posts recently

well done to BA for making this happen... great to see

goldcup
 

Are you telling me that he Mayor of Paris, amongst others, went onto the website and bought a ticket?

Some of the work seems to have been done by TCX crewing and rostering, at the considerable frustration of our own crews!

packamack-

Even better- so the mayor of Paris got a freebie, meaning they only sold 31 tickets. Pretty commercially viable.....

Info on load is accurate.

goldcup
 

As previously stated, the inagural flight was for invited guests. The flights on Monday and Tuesday were proving flights to test service, process and systems.

OK in fairness there are threads that people can search through and read on Open Skies. I suggest google "QANTAS, Jetstar and terms and conditions" as keywords and do some reading why BA crews are really concerned about what this new operation with the full backing of BA's managment may be able to do in future.
Peak summer and couldn't fill a B757? Not looking good. Air France will annihalate them.

Summer is off-peak for business pax

Logically, many people fly return journies. Therefore it is likely that on the very first flights, passengers are only flying the outbound leg and nobody is flying a return leg.

32 would therefore equate to normal operations of 64 passengers - not bad considering.

Re-Heat,

By the same logic, wouldn't people have booked return flights ex. NY in the first place?

That would negate the need of having to book another flight ex. Paris. Especially as it's a new airline and I doubt the average person would think 'hmm, OpenSkies' first flight coincides with my return trip, I'm going to only book a trip out with airline X, then book the return with OpenSkies'.

"Air France will annihalate them"
...and almost sounds as if you would take great delight in that...why?:confused:

It is a positive move the start up of any airline / service. Now is not the best time and if you go onto the web site the fares are expensive and will be easliy beaten by other EU airlines. We will have to wait and see, they will have to ensure a reliable / punctual service which is not best served with 2 airframes. Bon chance!

Precisely - you would have to wait to see OS passengers flying their return legs with the same airline to see "true" load factors.

Because Air France fly from Heathrow to the USA with their own metal and people, BA fly from Paris to the USA with a subsidiary firm on cheaper wages / terms / conditions. That's the difference. I repeat myself but it's what QANTAS did with Jetstar. They screwed their own staff over.

It really is amazing that BA didn't take the same approach as Air France. How much easier and less painful would it have been. There's absolutely no doubt what's going on, and people who doubt it need to open their eyes.

......because being the same gives you a clear competitive advantage? :rolleyes:

pacamack,

Look at the trouble BA had to go through to start OS. Starting a new airline not to mention the disputes with the workforce is a lot of effort when BA could use their already well known brand in other countries. All Air France had to do was timetable a few 777s through Heathrow to operate their US services from there. Clearly they (BA) don't want their image to 'contaminate' Openskies' success. Much like they didn't want the BA mainline pilots to 'contaminate' it.

Unless BA aren't confident that they are a world brand, then surely doing the same as Air France would give them a competitive advantage?

The plane was full!
 

http://www.flightglobal.com/articles...perations.html

So clearly those saying that the plane only has 32 passengers have got it wrong!

Congratulations Willie, Dale and the whole team - a lot of hard work has been marked by this first flight and I wish you all a successful business in the future.

(to be creating jobs in the curent climate is another reason for congratulations)

Yes, time4parties, clearly. I mean, who would ever imagine a BA spokesman might be lying?

FICO (BA's own flight ops software) clearly states that there are 32 passengers on board.

Or at least there were when it took off.

While I don't know how that system works / accounts for people - might it be that the remaining passengers are non-rev, or were sold through L'Avion?

No. FICO tells you what time doors closed, ac pushed back, load etc. Doesn't care where the tickets were bought. 32 it is. Sorry.

What will be the next routes for Openskies? I' ve read about BRU, AMS and MXP, when will start?

Depends how much money they lose with cut throat competition and incredibly high oil prices....

OpenSkies
 

Given that the rules do not allow advertising or sales in advance of receiving all of the US and EU approvals and this was only achieved at the end of May, the bookings look pretty good. Forward bookings are also strong. OpenSkies is a truly different experience and a great credit to everyone in the small group of airline professionals that built it in such a short period of time.

AIRBOSS OpenSkies is a truly different experience and a great credit to everyone in the small group of airline professionals that built it in such a short period of time. With the might of BA behind them Mickey Mouse could have set this up. The proof of the pudding is a few months down the road but Silverjet failed and that was was in the main run by a group of ex BA so called professionals. I wish OpenSkies well .

To be more accurate having been to the Maidenhead HQ of OS I left there mildly depressed at the group of hasbeens that had been brought out of retirement or left BA some years ago. It is run as a gentlemens club for the past great and good. The majority I saw there never did much when they were directly employed for BA but I am usually wrong so it will probably be ok, if it fails it will be BA's fault for launching at the wrong time.

HZ123
 

Have they drafted in DE of ex BAR, BACX and Lastly BACON fame?

I'm slightly confused who, on a site for aviation professionals, wants this airline to succeed?

I will place my month's salary on the fact that of the (pitiful) 32 passengers on board, most would have flown with BA through LHR rather than a 'competitor'.

So we now have a BA marketed and financed plane, flying BA passengers, with US cabin crew, TCX operations, local engineering, and non-mainline pilots on crap pay.

This is not job creation. It is outsourcing at it's most blatant.

Except for a handful of Waterside managers and retired BA pilots cashing in, openskies benefits no one in the industry.

HZ123,

Whereabouts in Maidenhead is their HQ?

err.....it isn't in Maidenhead?!!!

packamack,

HZ123 seems to think otherwise.

I appreciate that, but it still doesn't put the HQ in Maidenhead!