Well, the Prime A300 operated all weekend for the 'BIG BOYs'(again)

So, Foxtrot Oscar, when exactly will Primes luck run out? Perhaps your going to set up a better airline, dont think so somehow! Probably too busy trying to do the Sun crossword!

Why is it so hard for people in this industry to be positive? The term 'whingeing pomm' springs to mind.

Lets hope for the staff at Heavylift and the staff at EMA (inc handling agents), that Prime is a success.

Foxtrot_Oscar; I notice you have to set up a new ID before making your bold statement, are you worried everyone might know you? Don't know of such an incident, the return was subbed due to the aircraft being tech, I suppose half right is close. Tazzy I don't think it was the Sun crossword, maybe the Daily Sport.

Mr Angry from Purley; I guess I'll have to order my white stick as 6 outta 7 days seems good to me, of course the aircraft appears at EMA, IT'S PRIMES BASE.

Maybe some of you need to take a leaf out of Cougars thread, they have taken just as long, and had similar problems in setting up the aircraft, but you don't see everyone involved directly or indirectly putting the operation down publicly. No they congratulate themselves for what they have done. It angers me that the people involved in a project should criticise it. Work it out lads your just putting yourself down and making yourself look stupid. Either do something about it, or shut up. :mad:

Rapid Climber,

Being involved in airline commerce I will support Mr Angry from Purley - this bird is not earing enough money to pay the bills, even if it's out of EMA for 6 days. A300 needs to achive at least 250+ hours monthly to offer competitive rates (forget about a300 freighters utilization - they carrying much more profitable payload than pax - so DHL can afford it). I really doubt if any airline/broker will buy substitute or charter of a300pax if operator wants to cover fixed costs in 70-100 hrs utilization (I think that now Prime's bird doing about this fugure). If it's doing 1 roundtrip per day in average, it needs to do LHR-DXB rotations, not intraeuropean short hops.

CargoOne,
Surley its speculation to suggest how much she should fly to acheive competitive rates without knowing how much the lease payments are?(amongst other things) I dont think its doing too badly considering its only recently come into service.

CargoOne

250 Hr per month seams a lot for an aircraft which aims to do "rescue" sub charters.

Can anyone here from EAC comment on what there 737-200's do per month?

Prime have only come into exsistence, since Nov/Dec of last year, having an airline operational in that time, is simply amazing! Everyone knows the normal time, money and heartbreak it takes to get up and running and they have done in a matter of months.

This A300 is a -200 and would bearly make Turkey, never mind Dubai!The -200 does prefer to be operational, to keep the deffects to a minimum, even the battery packs, for the floor prox lighting, go dead in a matter of hours, unless the APU is run, its not a nice situation to be AOG, because of battery packs, with all of the other "New" defects arise on start up, because the aircraft has been on the ground for a number of days.

The Hajj will generate the cash for this aircraft this winter. PIA engineers know the A300 and will keep this thing operational over the Winter months.
I suspect this aircraft is purchased outright by a private investor, who probably is willing to wait 2/3 years to get a return on their investement. It is also quite common on the A300-200's to have a power by the hour deal with the leasing companies, but I do not believe this to be the situation, in this case.

Good luck to Prime, I have no envolvement, but I hope they do suceed, there are too many airlines going to the wall, at present. I hope they find their niche over the course of the present recession.

Yep, I can agree with those sentiments, EI - EI -O - I know exactly how long it takes to set up an airline (been working on this one for 20 months now but it feels an awful lot longer!) - usually the amount of time it takes to set one up is counted in years rather than months.

I understand that the passenger aircraft came from Farhad Azima, who is the ultimate owner/backer of the company.

Unfortunately, though there are lots of people here who think that they know how to run an airline, I can count on the fingers of hand those (to my personal knowledge) on here that have actually done it. :D :rolleyes: :D

Tazzy,

You might be surprised but I'm not speculating. I KNOW EXACTLY what money they wanted to achieve monthly with this bird, and that was reasonable. My only speculation is current utilization but I bet it is less or around 100 block hours.

Errrrr.......think that you`ll find that Prime is not a new airline set-up but a variation to the existing HLA AOC setup. How is it so amazing to take 8-9 months for a variation to an existing AOC - with the A300 already on the AOC (ok so its a freighter!). Also - because the aircraft has such appauling payload/range it really does limit the winter ops scenario. Agree would be great to see this work - but there aint gonna be a lot of support over the Winter months from EMA!! October onwards is showing a lot more avail accross the UK charter fleet - so why pay more dosh for more positioning when you can use a based unit instead?? :rolleyes: :rolleyes: :confused: :rolleyes:

The CAA views pax and cargo operations (quite correctly) as being very different and it is therefore fairly hard for a cargo operator to get recertified to carry pax but not the other way round.

Flug pants, you are probably correct about the winter in EMA.

I am a "Pruner" not a "Primer", but word has it, and it certainly, looks more than likely, that this aircraft will become a familar sight over the winter months in KHI.
With regards to the AOC is true, but I understand even, after the ops, admin, and C.C. were on the payrole @Prime, HLA had difficulty with the CAA issueing the C of A, because there were not enough Cabin Crew P.A. handsets on the aircraft, now picture the situation, where you call Toulouse and tell them you need a Mod to install additional PA's at the Cabin Crew Stn's on a 20-25 year old Aircraft. There response would be "OKAY, apply for R.F.C leadtime 6 months, Airbus issue a quote for the Mod, contact Daimler Chrysler, then there is another 6 month delay on parts", so yes I do think it was amazing, they were operational in a couple of months. Especially being in the CAA Juristriction, they pull no punches!!
No offence Guv, but even if you did go full steam ahead today, to get operational, you might not see the clouds until, summer 2002 and that would be an fair estimate and would be a fiine achievement, cost you a bloody fortune and you might be grounded, because you don't have enough Public Announcement systems on the aircrsaft. Think of the slots, recruitement, catering, maintanace etc. etc. -


Who needs that grief????? Good luck to Prime and the people behind it!

EI - E I - O,

What was the problem with PA headsets? How other A300 operators managed that?

For obvious reasons the Prime A300 has been away from EMA since tuesday which i can only assure readers is its longest spell away since it arrived with an AOC, rather late.

Winter @ EMA will be quiet, for info the Haj commences late January 2002. How old is the aircraft as the Saudis won't allow anything over 20 yrs old into Jeddah..
:mad: :mad:

Just wanted to correct an error in my earlier post - the A300 doesn't belong to Farhad Azima, but rather to GECAS who were apparently less than impressed with the CAA and the amount of work they had to do to get the aircraft into compliance!