Thomas Cook

[TheLocalYokel]

[textarea]Pilot's spectacular fundraiser

A pilot from Iron Acton has raised £25,000 for the charity Help for Heroes by putting on a special flight to see the Northern Lights.

Pamela McCoy, a captain with Thomas Cook Airways, flew an Airbus A320 from Bristol Airport over Scotland and into Icelandic airspace with 180 passengers. Each had paid £200 for the trip, and were given a souvenir programme and champagne while listening to commentary from astronomers and BBC Sky At Night presenter Peter Lawrence.

Mrs McCoy, senior first officer John Bowen and their five-strong crew put on the trip for free, and Airbus donated the use of the aeroplane for four hours.

Mrs McCoy, a pilot for more than 30 years, flew the plane as far north as she could in the time they had, turning off the cabin lights to give her passengers a better chance to see the Northern Lights, known as the Aurora Borealis.

Speaking after the event, Mrs McCoy thanked those organisations who had helped and said: "I've wanted to organise something like this for a while. The idea began to form and after many months of planning I'm delighted I was finally able to bring it to fruition.

To help the fundraiser, Bristol Airport waived its usual landing and handling charges, caterers did not charge for food on the flight, Clifton Wine Cellars donated champagne and the ground handling agent Servisair waived its usual aircraft handling fees.[/textarea]

http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/news/Pil ... ticle.html

An excellent gesture by all concerned especially as the passengers could have got a similar commercial flight from Bristol for a lower fare.

 

[Aviador]

I read that as "the Iron Maden pilot raises money for" .....sleepless nights!

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Thomas Cook and Monsatir

Good to see the first BRS flight to Monastir operating after the Tunisian troubles, with TCX 707 this afternoon.

I believe TOM resume their flights in the coming week.

 

[Aviador]

That is good new. Thomas Cook have cancelled some of their flights because of the troubles there.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Thomas Cook programme from BRS summer 2011

I had a count up recently of the programme for 2011 with all flights operated by the two based A 320s. It seems to be a couple down on summer 2010.

Monday

Corfu
Reus
Bodrum
Dalaman

Tuesday

Palma
Antalya (x 2)
Heraklion

Wednesday

Enfidha
Larnaca
Fuerteventura
Rhodes

Thursday

Faro
Zante (x 2)
Arrecife

Friday

Menorca
Tenerife
Bodrum
Dalaman
Corfu

Saturday

Palma (x 2)
Dalaman
Kos

Sunday

Ibiza
Paphos
Enfidha
Antalya

That's a total of 29, though a couple of Bristol departures do W routes to other airports or airport (possibly Exeter) before returning to their base.

The fact that easyJet or Ryanair (sometimes both) fly to Menorca, Dalaman, Bodrum, Palma, Fuerteventura, Ibiza, Paphos, Tenerife, Corfu, Heraklion, Faro, Reus and Arrecife shows the extent to which the low-cost airlines have infiltrated what was once solely charter markets.

 

[alphagolf]

Summer 2012

Thomas Cook to commence weekly flights to Skiathos in Greece, I think this route was last served by Viking and XL Airways before them, so a welcome return to Bristol for this route!

alphagolf

 

[TheLocalYokel]

In the past Skiathos has been a double drop from BRS with the likes of Volos or Kavala.

It seems the reason was partly commercial and partly technical in that the Skiathos runway permits only the Boeing 757 of the aircraft commonly used by charter airlines to the UK to generally make it back to the UK non-stop.

It appears that aircraft such as the A 320 and 321 and Boeing 737s have to fuel stop en route back to the UK and so companies programme double drops rather than pure fuel stops.

If this is the case I wonder if we can expect to see Volos or Kavala back. Santorini is another former Greek destination flown from BRS as is Crete's other airport at Chania.

This summer TOM appears to have dropped the long-standing Thessaloniki route.

 

[big g]

Thomas Cook has added an extra Palma flight on Mondays operated using a 757-200, 235Y, the A/C is operating a W pattern from BHX-PMI-BRS-PMI-BHX and the extra service will stop on 5th September.

Details:
TCX 7045, Dept PMI: 12:45, Arr BRS: 14:15.
TCX 7044, Dept BRS: 15:35, Arr PMI: 19:00

Nice to see a TCX 752 in today.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Thanks for that big g.

I'd noticed the extra Palma rotation on the arrivals board but hadn't realised it was a visiting B 757.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

There is now a Saturday night TCX flight to Las Palmas - out 2040 and back 0550 on Sunday mornings. It didn't operate in May or June.

 

[big g]

I guess that's more good news for TCX, looks like it will be operating till 30th October as the 7144/5, but from the 16th October the Dep/Arr times change varying week to week.

 

[big g]

Good news with most of their flights going out full or over sold this month.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Good news with most of their flights going out full or over sold this month.

I know a couple who booked very late and had to fly from BHX to Zante last week with Thomas Cook as they couldn't find anything available from BRS, seemingly because it was sold out.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

[textarea]Pilot hangs up his wings

Captain John Connor, an airline pilot for 44 years, has hung up his professional wings after piloting his final flight into Bristol Airport where he was based for more than 20 years.

His Thomas Cook A320 from Paphos was greeted by a spectacular water arch courtesy of the airport fire department when it touched down and there was a guard of honour formed by airport staff when he disembarked from his aircraft, accompanied by cabin crew and First Officer, David Perry.[/textarea]
Full report and picture at this link:
http://www.bristol-business.net/?p=2611

Crikey - he must be nearly as old as me. Based at Bristol for over 20 years!

He will have some stories to tell about operating in and out of the 'interesting' Bristol Airport runway.

Enjoy a great retirement Captain John.

 

[big g]

[textarea]Pilot hangs up his wings

Captain John Connor, an airline pilot for 44 years, has hung up his professional wings after piloting his final flight into Bristol Airport where he was based for more than 20 years.

His Thomas Cook A320 from Paphos was greeted by a spectacular water arch courtesy of the airport fire department when it touched down and there was a guard of honour formed by airport staff when he disembarked from his aircraft, accompanied by cabin crew and First Officer, David Perry.[/textarea]
Full report and picture at this link:
http://www.bristol-business.net/?p=2611

Crikey - he must be nearly as old as me. Based at Bristol for over 20 years!

He will have some stories to tell about operating in and out of the 'interesting' Bristol Airport runway.

Enjoy a great retirement Captain John.

I have had the pleasure to work with John and he had some story's to tell, he started flying at 18 with the RAF and flew in the Phantom F4, he was also part of the Flying Crusaders Aerobatic Team.

It's sad to see him go and as talented a pilot he was it's a shame his last landing in to BRS was an auto-land due to the heavy fog.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Skiathos - summer 2012

A poster on the Dried Plum reports that Skiathos will be operated by TCX next summer on Friday mornings.

My alter ego did a bit of research re that post and came up with the following.

This one seems to come and go down the years.

Viking and Kiss tried it in summer 2010 with a joint route to Salonika which fizzled out when Kiss went bust in high summer that year and Viking all but disappeared from BRS at the same time. A shame to see the TOM route to Salonika axed this summer after many years.

I remember InterEuropean doing Skiathos from BRS in 1993. There was then a gap until 2002 when an airline called Nordic Air Link did the route that summer - I'm not sure who for.

The next three summers saw a joint route to Skiathos and Volos, in 2003 by an airline called Azzurria that had an A320 based at BRS that year and then the XL Group took it on, replacing Volos with Kavalla in 2006. XL last did it in 2007 but it was a single destination by then.

Salonika, Volos, Kavalla, Santorini, Chania (Crete), all Greek charter routes operated from BRS in the past ten years but no longer.

Let's hope that Thomas Cook can make a go of it.

Incidentally, I presume it will replace either Mahon or Tenerife, both of which have been TCX Friday morning departures in recent summers.

 

[Aviador]

Many of the Greece routes seem to come and go from many airports. I've never figured out why they never really seem to do well, whether it's the lack out decent hotels what?

 

[TheLocalYokel]

An additional TCX in and out today from/to Arrecife (an A321 according to Mayfly) - no doubt because of school half term.

BRS has only one based TCX unit in winter, an A 320, which was used for Enfidha (am) and Kittila (pm) today.

 

[big g]

As far as I know it was a last minute flight in to BRS but was due to position out to CWL but that may have changed!

I think I heard someone say it was G-OMYA A320.

Not the best info sorry.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Mayfly showed it as TCX 7017 arriving from Arrecife at 1630 and departing to Arrecife at 1745, with equipment listed as A 321.

Next Sunday (19th) Mayfly is showing identical movements which is why I wondered whether it's for the half-term holiday (or holiday between terms in Bristol City Council Education Dept's six-term calendar).

I was out walking yesterday afternoon several miles from the airport and through the clouds saw an aircraft bigger than an A320 heading into BRS about half past four.

I caught only brief glimpses as it went in and out of low cloud and, to be honest, I thought it was a 757 but it wasn't in Thomson blue. That's why I checked later to see what it might have been.