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Old February 4th 21, 06:22 PM posted to uk.transport.london
tim...[_2_] tim...[_2_] is offline
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Default Ryanair to axe UK domestic and non-EU routes



"Recliner" wrote in message
...
On Thu, 4 Feb 2021 12:56:42 +0000, Roland Perry
wrote:

In message , at 11:56:15 on
Thu, 4 Feb 2021, Recliner remarked:
On Thu, 4 Feb 2021 11:13:06 +0000, Roland Perry
wrote:

In message , at 10:54:24 on Thu, 4 Feb 2021,
Recliner remarked:
Roland Perry wrote:
In message , at 08:26:10 on Thu, 4 Feb
2021,
Recliner remarked:
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/business...lans-axe-domes
tic-routes/

Ryanair's spat with the Civil Aviation Authority escalated on
Wednesday
night as plans emerged to axe all domestic routes and all services
from
Britain to non-EU countries.

The budget carrier will only operate out of London Stansted airport
and
will cull 13 routes to Morocco, Ukraine, Montenegro, and Norway.

A row erupted in December between Ryanair and the CAA over
pre-Brexit rule
changes. At the centre of the dispute is Ryanair's use of so-called
"wet-leasing", where airlines hire aircraft and crew to operate
services on
their behalf.

Ryanair only has one UK-registered aircraft. The CAA wanted less
than half
of Ryanair's UK services to be run by "wet leased" aircraft.

Ryanair is believed to have planned to increase its number of UK
registered
aircraft to three by April 2021 and offered a pool of aircraft under
a
"white list" approach. This was rejected by the CAA on Jan 22,
according to
industry sources.

Ryanair and CAA did not comment on Wednesday night.

The CAA's Paul Smith said at the time: "A UK airline with a
significant
presence in the UK, should not rely heavily on using wet-leased,
foreign-registered aircraft."

Is the wet-leasing something to do with delays in delivery of 737Max,
of
which they've reportedly got 210 on order?

I suspect FR-UK is wet-leasing 738s from FR-Ireland. The CAA wants at
least
half of FR-UK's non-EU flights to be on UK-registered planes. I don't
think
it's anything to do with 737 MAX delays, as FR has plenty of 738s, more
than enough to meet current demand.

It's all a bit opaque to the traveller, who might assume that the only
airport "Ryanair" is operating from in the UK is Stansted.

But yes, Ryanair-Ireland is flying from Dublin to all their traditional
destinations in the UK on at least some days of the week, some months in
their schedule.

Yes, I think it means that they are threatening to close all their UK
bases except Stansted.


Who is "they"? The prospect of Ryanair-UK being disjoint from
Ryanair-Eire has already been floated.


Ryanair corporate (ie, O'Leary). There will be little decision-making in
FR-UK, but having those bases would generate
some UK jobs.



At the moment Ryanair-Stansted isn't running any UK internal flights.


Sure, it looks like they're all suspended for now, during the lockdown. FR
doesn't run near-empty planes. I think, even
in good times, most UK domestic flights are marginal at best, as Flybe was
the latest to prove.


FlyBe operated from marginal airports

a regional network based around a genuine London airport has to be more
viable, even if not to every current (normal world) destination