[AMcWhirter]

[quote quote=1026393]It was always busy,[/quote]

With aviation it’s the average yield per seat that determines whether or not a flight is profitable. A flight may be full but is it profitable ?

Travellers were saying the same when EZY dropped several routes from LGW (in the period before Covid-19).

[canucklad]

[quote quote=1026515]With aviation it’s the average yield per seat that determines whether or not a flight is profitable. A flight may be full but is it profitable ?[/quote]

And that becomes a little more complicated when , as is being discussed here . airlines are using feeder flights onto long haul.
In the past I’ve seen KLM advertise flights ex EDI to JFK cheaper than return flights AMS –bonkers

[transtraxman]

“Aer Lingus seeks permission for UK-US routes”, (Routesonline, 11-12-20)

https://www.routesonline.com/news/29/breaking-news/294898/aer-lingus-seeks-permission-for-uk-us-routes/

The routes are to Boston, New York (JFK) and Orlando. The interesting point is that Aer Lingus wants to codeshare with BA.

[Polly]

EI is owned by IAG, so BA would get a bite of the cash

[Carajillo2Sugar]

Oooh! That’ll be due to EI finally getting approval by the US DOT to join BA/AA/IB/AY in the JV on trans-Atlantic routes.

[transtraxman]

I wrote this reply to Simon1 on the thread ” Virgin Atlantic removes Manchester-India services from its inventory”, but thought would be most relevant here as well.

SimonS1 #1044222

“Proves once again that the traffic for such point to point flights doesn’t exist.”
That is based on a false assumption. Why would Virgin Atlantic programme flights to Delhi and Mumbai if it did not see demand?I must point out that your comment comes one day after launching its first flight to Pakistan from Manchester – Islamabad.On top of which Virgin Atlantic also restarted a service to Barbados from M/c.The analytical teams in each airline look at the possible demand (passenger and cargo) for different destinations and the potential profitibility of each. It seems that in the changed circumstances of 2020 the demand experienced by the airline for Mumbai and Delhi was lower that expected (or could cannabalise its services from Heathrow).

Aer Lingus is setting up a UK airline to fly 3 routes from Manchester to the USA all codeshared with BA. This is the cheap way of setting up a network (you sell it, others fly it). But I do not think that is the end of it. There are more destinations on offer in North America and the Caribbean, while everybody forgets about East, West and South Africa. Then Singapore, Hong Kong and Tokyo are musts with the possible addition of Seoul and other destinations in China (Shanghai?)

The catchment area for Manchester airport is almost as large as that for Heathrow – it stretches from North Wales to Hull, from Stoke to Cumbria, from Sheffield to Teeside. It is larger than the whole population of Scotland or Ireland. Thus I am convinced that an airline network set up in Manchester would be needed and could be viable. I am not saying that such a network has to be BA led. It could be based on alliances, oneworld, Star and Skyteam or a combination of them. Here we are looking at the needs of passengers (and cargo), not pandering to any one airline´s interests.

“Hence the rather pointless argument promoted by those who think BA should operate long haul services from the regions.
In fact I recall Virgin has a union jack somewhere in the livery….doesn’t that make it a flag carrier?”
The Union Flag on the tailplane of Virgin Atlantic aircraft owes more to the 2% shares that Richard Branson holds over and above Delta Airlines than to any strategy designed by the bearded one. Delta runs the airline for its own interests. That is most clear. So British? I doubt it.

[Nogbad01]

>> AMcWhirter: With aviation it’s the average yield per seat that determines whether or not a flight is profitable. A flight may be full but is it profitable ?

Of course, and I suspect BA could make more profitable use of the slots to fly a 777 on a long haul route. Given that a lot of BA’s holiday routes are from Gatwick, I always wondered why they would remove the feeder from Manchester and make BA holidays a much less attractive offering. Obviously it was more profitable that way, but I would be interested why they are now restarting the link.

[esselle]

[postquote quote=1045228][/postquote]

I am sure that airlines are good at working out for themselves how to deploy their planes, so I won’t join any debates about whether they should or should not be opening routes/bases in airports where they are currently not present.

On the Union Flag point, Virgin nicked the flag rather cleverly for their winglets and names (not tailplanes) at the time when Ayling decided to ditch it from BA’s livery in favour of world art. Branson was very much in charge at that time, and it was a huge PR coup for VS, and has been part of VS livery ever since.

Remember Maggie draping her hankie over the fin of a BA model aircraft with one of the “new” designs?

[SimonS1]

Indeed esselle, with all the analytics at airlines disposal there is a reason why no airline has done this on anything other than an opportunistic route by route basis.

In fact with exception of Germany I can’t think of another European country where the home operators run a meaningful long haul network from a second city. A few have tried but with limited success.

The market wasn’t there pre Covid and it sure as hell isn’t there now.

[transtraxman]

With the news of UK flights being banned from Hong Kong an article was published 21-12-20 in Aviation24.be
“The Netherlands and Belgium (followed by other European countries) ban flights from UK to prevent spread of Covid-19 mutation.”

The Netherlands and Belgium (followed by other European countries) ban flights from UK to prevent spread of Covid-19 mutation

To the headlines the article adds other destinations:
Italy bans flights from the UK as well. France and Germany are expected to follow suit.
And Austria, Italy, Ireland, Luxembourg, Latvia, Romania, Bulgaria, …
Elsewhere, also Kuwait and Turkey prohibit flights from the UK.

In addition to this list I have heard of South Africa and Denmark. This makes it look like a general exclusion of UK flights from travelling abroad.
We all know the new strain of virus is limited to the South East of England and the UK government is trying to keep it from extending to the rest of the country.That leads to the question why the other home nations as well as the north of England have to suffer the same flight ban.
Several countries in Europe have two hubs…..e.g.
Madrid and Barcelona
Frankfurt and Munich
Rome and Milan
If the UK had an alternative hub in Manchester then there would need to be a total lockdown on flights. It does not have to be as big as London but could provide an alternative for cancelled passengers. The economy could keep going as well with less interruption to traffic.

[esselle]

[postquote quote=1071010][/postquote]

So if you live in London and need to get to HKG, and Manchester is operating flights to HKG, you would/could drive from London to Manchester………..

[transtraxman]

Not if ALL flights from the UK to Hong Kong are banned. That is the question …Do they need to ban all the flights or only those from the South East?
By the way, flights from Luton , Heathrow and City are banned, but the airports of Stansted and Gatwick are outside the infected area.

[IanFromHKG]

[quote quote=1071336]Not if ALL flights from the UK to Hong Kong are banned. That is the question …Do they need to ban all the flights or only those from the South East?[/quote]

What the HK government NEED to do and what they ACTUALLY do don’t always coincide, and they have banned all passenger flights from the UK. CX have cancelled all UK passenger flights until 10 January. We are waiting to see what BA will do and whether they will continue to fly – if they don’t, both Offspring are going to have a challenge getting back to university.

Incidentally they leave hotel quarantine at 23:59 tonight but it seems likely that they will be subjected to another five days’ home quarantine, which is absurd. They were tested before they left, they were tested on arrival, they were tested again ten days after arrival, they have to do an additional test on day 19 or 20 – it’s complete overkill, given that the normal incubation period for covid is 5-6 days and the highest medical estimate I have seen is 14 days.

This quarantine extension will, of course, take them up to Christmas itself. Senior Offspring was already enduring 14 days of hotel quarantine to be with us for 9 days, now she will only be able to go outside for four days of her trip – unless, of course, it gets extended because of a lack of flights. It makes me boiling mad…

[AMcWhirter]

Here’s something I would never have thought possible … this tweet revealed that BOAC once operated flights between BHX and JFK.

BOAC Vickers Super VC10-1151 G-ASGO at Birmingham in June 1971. Waiting to work the short lived service to New York JFK.
© Carl Ford via Flickr. pic.twitter.com/m4T1Nxsj0z

— AusterityAirliners (@AusterityAirli1) January 4, 2021

[SimonS1]

PIA’s flight from Islamabad to Manchester yesterday carried ONE passenger.

Even accepting that Covid will have had some impact, I can’t see other airlines rushing to replicate this….

https://www.geo.tv/amp/327998-pia-flight-for-370-passengers-departs-for-manchester-with-one-on-board

[Author]

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