Archive Flybe at Cardiff Airport

[Jerry]

Flybe have released their schedule up until June 2018.
LCY in the winter is in the system but comes up as unavailable at the moment and it looks like it will be stopping in March. It also looks like the E195 and Dash will be mixing up the routes a bit. So some EDI and DUB rotations are on the Dash and some BHD are on an E195.

Belfast is 11 weekly 2 daily Monday-Friday daily Sunday
Berlin 2 weekly Sunday and Thursday
Cork 2 weekly Sunday and Thursday
Dublin is 14 weekly Sunday to Wednesday 2 daily Thursday and Friday 3 daily
Dusseldorf 1 weekly Saturday
Edinburgh 12 weekly 2 daily Sunday to Friday
Faro 4 weekly Sunday Tuesday Thursday and Saturday
Glasgow 6 weekly Sunday to Friday but Sunday flight comes up as unavailable at the moment.
Jersey 3 weekly Monday Friday and Saturday
Milan 3 weekly Sunday Monday and Friday
Paris 10 weekly 2 daily Monday Friday and Sunday daily Tuesday Wednesday Thursday and Saturday
Munich 2 weekly Monday and Friday
Verona 2 weekly Saturday and Wednesday
Rome 2 weekly Saturday and Tuesday

Looking at the schedule i believe there is more to come from Flybe DUB EDI BHD and GLA don't have any Saturday flights. I'm surprised with how well Rome is doing that it's only 2 weekly and not 3. Looking at Saturdays only 2 aircraft are in use 1 E195 and the Dash and it's only used morning and afternoon. So definitely more to come from Flybe. Another note is that with LCY gone I'm wondering if they would be better off swapping the Dash for an E jet that way the base would be uniform.

 

[Tinkerman]

Looks like a great schedule to me, focussing on what BE and CWL should be focussing on and that is key connectivity routes such as EDI, DUB, BHD and CDG. Great to see BHD finally twice daily (had some intel on this yesterday) hence why i made a post regarding BHD only being daily. These extra frequencies should in theory be able to compete with EZY's BRS operation, in particular DUB and BHD/BFS (at BRS).

More to come though guys.

 

[superking]

Easy don't do Dublin from brs. Ryanair and Stobart do Dublin.
On a side note yes it does look good and also ramping up some of the routes.

 

[Tinkerman]

Apologies Superking, i meant FR with the DUB.

Seems to be a few gaps for some new destinations too, and whether there may even be more than that. An alter ego of mine suggested on another forum the other day that something was imminent with the knowledge of some of these BE nuggets. Just goes to show to those who think they know better actually know nothing. Never, ever shoot the messenger ever again 😉🙂

 

[Jerry]

Looking at the schedule there appears to be a 5 hour gap for the Dash on Tuesday's, Wednesday's and Thursday's so potentially extra rotations on existing routes or some new destinations to fill the gap? Saturday's is definitely incomplete and would be a good day for those charters that the new CEO mentioned? Until they get them sorted they may not be able to sort out the times for EDI, DUB, BHD and GLA as none have flights on Saturday's at the moment.

On Wales Air Forum it's been suggested that a 3rd E jet could be on it's way. If that does happen then it'll be interesting to see if it replaces the Dash, which would make sense considering it was only brought to do LCY which looks like it's been dropped. If not and the base goes up to 4 aircraft then there could be a lot more new routes on the way! Hopefully it'll be the latter!

 

[superking]

Looking at the schedule there appears to be a 5 hour gap for the Dash on Tuesday's, Wednesday's and Thursday's so potentially extra rotations on existing routes or some new destinations to fill the gap? Saturday's is definitely incomplete and would be a good day for those charters that the new CEO mentioned? Until they get them sorted they may not be able to sort out the times for EDI, DUB, BHD and GLA as none have flights on Saturday's at the moment.

On Wales Air Forum it's been suggested that a 3rd E jet could be on it's way. If that does happen then it'll be interesting to see if it replaces the Dash, which would make sense considering it was only brought to do LCY which looks like it's been dropped. If not and the base goes up to 4 aircraft then there could be a lot more new routes on the way! Hopefully it'll be the latter!

The spare E195is going to Southampton as flybe is worried about easyjet doing a bit of work from there. I don't know what E175 jets are spare or not doing much,as they would be a better bet than the dash.Watch this space.

 

[Jerry]

The spare E195is going to Southampton as flybe is worried about easyjet doing a bit of work from there. I don't know what E175 jets are spare or not doing much,as they would be a better bet than the dash.Watch this space.

The only other option would be whether or not they will be wet leasing to Stobart Air or not. It's a case of wait and see.

 

[Jerry]

With the Dash staying for Summer 2018 will it still have to rotate through Belfast now? If the crew is now or will be CWL based could that be an indication in the future that Flybe might be considering basing more Dash 8 aircraft in the future?

 

[superking]

Mutterings Stobart buying 3 E195 jets to lease to flybe.

 

[Jerry]

Mutterings Stobart buying 3 E195 jets to lease to flybe.

They've bought them. 3 that Flybe already use and Flybe will continue to lease them until the 2nd half of 2018.

 

[Jerry]

I wonder if in the long run we may see Flybe and Stobart Air merge?

 

[Jerry]

The one thing Stobart does have is money! And Flybe could do with an investor with lots of cash! I think it something to watch and see what happens.

I was looking at the gap in the Dash's schedule and was wondering if they could fill the 5 hour gap they had on Tuesdays Wednesdays and Thursdays with some new routes in France and Geneva going year round. The Dash might well be better suited for a weekly Geneva in the summer. Also with France a weekly Rennes might be a possibility. EXT has a weekly and Wales has a Celtic connection with Brittany and other suggestion would be a weekly Caen. Normandy is a beautiful place and has lots of history and like Rennes Bristol has no flights there. It's actually the one part of France along with Brittany that EZY and FR don't cover from BRS. So there could be the potential to attract some people from across the bridge.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Ryanair tried Dinard for a year when it opened its BRS base in 2007 but it didn't really catch on, although they did manage to get up to 75% and 84% load factors in July and August respectively in 2008, albeit such lfs aren't usually to Ryanair's taste, and the rest of that summer was lower anyway. Oddly, Ryanair announced Dinard's return for summer 2012 but then removed it from the booking system after a few weeks, presumably because forward bookings were not up to scratch.

Brittany is probably much better suited to smaller aircraft from provincial UK so if Rennes can work from EXT with Flybe it should from CWL.

I don't know how many people from the Bristol area use the EXT flight to Rennes.

 

[Foxlimayankee]

Interesting, so Stobart have bought the E195s that BE claimed were on very expensive leases and uneconomical for them to operate. Why would a leasing company sell them if they are making good money off the leases from BE? Unless Stobart paid over the odds, which again seems strange.

 

[Jerry]

Interesting, so Stobart have bought the E195s that BE claimed were on very expensive leases and uneconomical for them to operate. Why would a leasing company sell them if they are making good money off the leases from BE? Unless Stobart paid over the odds, which again seems strange.

Stobart paid $56 million for the 3 aircraft off the lessor GOAL. Flybe will pay an estimated $9.2 million is lease fees up until the 2nd half of 2018 when the aircraft go to Stobart. I'd imagine Stobart's will then use at least 1 with it's Flybe franchise from SEN and i'm wondering if they'll look at using the other's on the more busier Aer Lingus Regional routes. Of course by then it's possible Stobart could've bought more possibly all the ex BE ones.
http://www.londonstockexchange.com/exchange/news/alliance-news/detail/1501258632037640600.html

 

[Marko1]

Flybe are ending their london city route from end of October.

 

[Jerry]

It's unknown at the moment. The flights are there on the website but they are down as unavailable. It seems to be the way with LCY that Flybe seem to leave it until the last minute. If they don't go ahead with them for the winter then it'll be interesting to see what they do as the aircraft is scheduled down for GLA mid morning and after it returns from LCY ORK and JER in the night.

 

[Marko1]

It's been made official this morning. The route is being stopped

 

[Jerry]

It's been made official this morning. The route is being stopped

Seen the article now in Wales Online about it. Blames APD and barely mentions the passenger numbers! Maybe the Welsh government can use the loss to get APD devolved to Wales. Maybe as well a 'rescue' deal from the Welsh Government is possible as well.
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/business/business-news/airline-flybe-scrapping-cardiff-airport-13452339

 

[Marko1]

It is somewhat sad but you have to get bums on seats in sufficient numbers to make it work. However on a very positive note I travelled through the airport on board Flybe's flight to Rome and I have to say i am most impressed with Flybe and its route to Rome. The flight was full both ways and the service on board was exemplary . I haven't flown from cardiff for a few years and I am impressed with the improvements made. Personally I think the size of aircraft really suits Cardiff and other routes to Southern Europe certainly should work. I'm surprised that neither Ryanair or vueling haven't started the route to Rome earlier tbh .