LyddAir - Trislanders to Far East

[Robing]

News from LyddAir!

GBDOT ferry trip to Manila - After 12 years of service at Lydd Airport the last commercial service with a Trislander took place at Lydd on the 12th of April.

Aircraft departed Lydd 16 April for a route Lydd - Corfu - Luxor - Bahrain - Karachi - Calcutta - Phuket - Singapore Selatar - Kuching - Davao - Manila arriving on time on Saturday 26th April.

I have loaded some images of the ferry trip here (http://s563.photobucket.com/albums/ss71/robingclimb/) for those that may be interested

Hand flown by Jonathan Gordon, MD & owner of LyddAir and with the superb assistance of Mike (http://www.whiteroseaviation.co.uk/) at White Rose Aviation

GOJAV will depart on the same route in the coming weeks after completion of heavy maintenance at Phoenix Aero Engineering Lydd

This has been a super aircraft type for the development at Lydd Airport supporting scheduled services and ad hoc charter with cargo and passengers.

Thanks to all the flight crew and engineering staff past and present for the great support you have given us

Robin Gordon

[Jerbourg]

Is Lydd Air going to be a single type operator with Pa31's or will the BNT be replaced with another type?

[no sponsor]

Great photos, and a set of flights which must have been a very rewarding experience!

[Robing]

LyddAir operates PA31-350 X 3, B200 X 1, B58 X 1 on scheduled and charter services.

[GBALU53]

The demise of the Trislander,how much longer has this great work horse got left in her.
Blueislands have two of them but for how long.
Aurigny down in the Channel Islands have about five operational at any one time.
With new regulations comming in over single crew operations it looks like it is just a matter of time before they might be going to places like Duxford and other museums to take up residence.
Maybe one each should go to the airports down in the Channel Islands as monuments to there operation down there??:ok:

[SleekMover]

Cut my commercial teeth on Skytrek Trislanders - sad to see they will no longer be plying the Lydd/Le Touquet route.

Good luck to you all at Lyddair - happy memories.

[Expressflight]

I visited GCI last week flying on the GR Trislander service from DNR.

The aircraft had obviously just be resprayed and retrimmed and was very smart. Had lunch one day there with one of our pilots from a previous operation and he loves flying them and can fly a coupled ILS with the Century V autopilot so the CAA are happy. I think there is plenty of life in them yet although he said that Twin Otters have been mentioned as possible replacements. It does seem rather odd though to be flying on a scheduled service where the skipper has to cycle the carb heat from time to time!

[magvelda]

Absolutely delighted to have been of assistance.:ok:

[GBALU53]

About 25 years ago Aurigny operated two Twin Otters G-BFZP and G-BIMW,
in those day the Twin Otter did not work out, the aircraft was not ideal for inter island operations, although idea for the Alderney-Southampton route.
So will they turn the clock back??
The only thing around at the moment to replace a Trislander is another Trislander.
So how much longer will the Trislander be a feature of the Channel islands landscape??:ok:

[Jerbourg]

Actually Balu it was G-BFGP & G-BIMW..

[Robing]

LyddAir's last Trislander "hopped" down to SE Asia in July.

For those that may be interested in the ferry trip some further photo's are available at the same URL as mentioned in the start of this thread.

We may have a requirement for another, ideally long nose, a/c - does anyone know of any on the market?

Regards

Robin