Parking at BHD
 

Can anyone explain why all the aircraft at BHD last night were parked side on to the gates rather than nose in as usual? Even the BMI A320 (usually angled) seemed to be lengthways. This was late on, after the last arrival. Is this normal or am I right in thinking it is unusual?

Not familiar with BHD at all, but it sounds like the aircraft were parked into wind. This is quite a normal procedure with the gale force winds that we've seen around the UK lately.

When parked nose into gate a gale force wind could spin an aircraft into wind, with devastating effects to the aircraft itself, the ones parked next to it and anyone around it.

So to prevent that from happening we park them into wind to start with <img src="smile.gif" border="0"> .

Thanks Pheonix,

Seems obvious when you think about it!!