What services you are using?

[markietg]

I flew this morning with FR to Paris BVA then onwards to Dublin. LBA seemed busy but it took me only 4mins to join the short security queue and quickly through. I had lounge access gifted by a friend so had a full English which looked 100 times better than the one posted on here a few days back. Tasted good too. Boarded at gate 1 and was bussed to a remote stand. 168 on board. The captain told us we had a 1hr ATC delay…not good when I had only 1hr45mins at BVA. I think we lifted off at 0645 with a flight time of just over an hour. Landed into BVA with 25mins until my next flight gate closed Straight through immigration and round to departures. BVA has 2 small terminals but luckily my inbound & outbound flights were into & out of T1. Security was a complete shambles and took 20 mins with just 20-25 people in front of me. When I got to gate E the Dublin flight was still boarding. Nice wait outside in the sunshine with most of the people in the queue vaping away. Nothing said to anyone….well, maybe different rules in France.

 

[LBA4EVER]

I flew this morning with FR to Paris BVA then onwards to Dublin. LBA seemed busy but it took me only 4mins to join the short security queue and quickly through. I had lounge access gifted by a friend so had a full English which looked 100 times better than the one posted on here a few days back. Tasted good too. Boarded at gate 1 and was bussed to a remote stand. 168 on board. The captain told us we had a 1hr ATC delay…not good when I had only 1hr45mins at BVA. I think we lifted off at 0645 with a flight time of just over an hour. Landed into BVA with 25mins until my next flight gate closed Straight through immigration and round to departures. BVA has 2 small terminals but luckily my inbound & outbound flights were into & out of T1. Security was a complete shambles and took 20 mins with just 20-25 people in front of me. When I got to gate E the Dublin flight was still boarding. Nice wait outside in the sunshine with most of the people in the queue vaping away. Nothing said to anyone….well, maybe different rules in France.

Funny how BVA has 2 small seperate terminals but each terminal is only about half the size of the terminal at LBA!
bva security flows straight through into the tiny departure lounge so you get a bottle neck point. Still its a good airport esp for say a younger traveler with less hand luggage passing through paris and certainly seems cheaper many a time to pass through bva to a destination than direct from lba.

 

[AirBingley]

Flew out to REU on LS297 today. Arrived around 10.15 so airport very quiet and tiny waits for checkin and security. After historically favourable experiences booked the 1432 lounge at the pre 1045 rate. Staff right the way to the lounge were lovely and the charm offensive is working. Once in 1432 it was like a bad Faulty Towers. After a long wait guy told us what breakfast we could order and another came to take the order then chef decided he was doing lunch no the wait would be more. They really need to get their act together as there were 3 of us in there! When things settled down what we had was nice be the service picked up but if this is outsourcing, bring it back in house!

Flight almost full, pushed back early and despite the slow flight south we still arrived early, friendly efficient crew.

As an aside did anyone see the YEP review of 1432 and the “sorry breakfast” it’s a great space and deserves proper service.

 

[markietg]

Yesterday afternoon, after a quick pub lunch, I flew FR DUB-LBA landing at approx 1530. After being an avid viewer of Blue Sky Aviation over the summer I know LBA gets busy at a certain time on Saturday afternoon, so I was expecting a few delays. Good Grief. It’s only when you’re in the middle of it all, and listening to other people’s reactions you understand how badly our new arrivals area and procedures are needed.
The flight from Dublin was 38mins in duration. After a “firm” touchdown we taxied to stand 9. Doors opened and ready to disembark. The captain then made a PA to say we had to wait for busses to take us to the arrivals door and he’d been advised this would be 30mins from now. This was greeted by mass calls onboard of “we can walk from here” and other colourful language. At 1555 2 busses duly arrived and it took 10mins to cram us all in, I think the flight was totally full. We then went on a little tour of the apron due to fuel trucks blocking our route and to the arrivals door. When we parked there were multiple Jet2 & Swissport agents waiting and I’d take an estimated guess of between 150-200 pax waiting to just enter the building and up the stairs to the immigration walkway. We had to wait a good 5-7mins for these pax to enter before we were allowed off the bus. We then got off, turned left and walked into a portacabin with RoI and Channel Island arrivals on the door. Into a Police passport/ID check area but no police were here today so straight through to the arrivals hall. OMG. Now I’ve read reports on here over the years of how busy it can get, but I’ve never experienced it myself…until now. From the moment I entered to exiting the arrivals area was 10mins. There were queues of people just lining up to exit. One baggage belt had 7 flights listed for bag reclaim. Absolutely crazy but this must happen regularly.
So from landing to exiting the building, with no baggage to collect took 45mins. Almost 10mins longer than my flight over.
Roll on May 1st 2025.

 

[LBA787]

Yesterday afternoon, after a quick pub lunch, I flew FR DUB-LBA landing at approx 1530. After being an avid viewer of Blue Sky Aviation over the summer I know LBA gets busy at a certain time on Saturday afternoon, so I was expecting a few delays. Good Grief. It’s only when you’re in the middle of it all, and listening to other people’s reactions you understand how badly our new arrivals area and procedures are needed.
The flight from Dublin was 38mins in duration. After a “firm” touchdown we taxied to stand 9. Doors opened and ready to disembark. The captain then made a PA to say we had to wait for busses to take us to the arrivals door and he’d been advised this would be 30mins from now. This was greeted by mass calls onboard of “we can walk from here” and other colourful language. At 1555 2 busses duly arrived and it took 10mins to cram us all in, I think the flight was totally full. We then went on a little tour of the apron due to fuel trucks blocking our route and to the arrivals door. When we parked there were multiple Jet2 & Swissport agents waiting and I’d take an estimated guess of between 150-200 pax waiting to just enter the building and up the stairs to the immigration walkway. We had to wait a good 5-7mins for these pax to enter before we were allowed off the bus. We then got off, turned left and walked into a portacabin with RoI and Channel Island arrivals on the door. Into a Police passport/ID check area but no police were here today so straight through to the arrivals hall. OMG. Now I’ve read reports on here over the years of how busy it can get, but I’ve never experienced it myself…until now. From the moment I entered to exiting the arrivals area was 10mins. There were queues of people just lining up to exit. One baggage belt had 7 flights listed for bag reclaim. Absolutely crazy but this must happen regularly.
So from landing to exiting the building, with no baggage to collect took 45mins. Almost 10mins longer than my flight over.
Roll on May 1st 2025.

This is just a general observation but having worked in and around LBA for close to 20 years I’d say what you experienced has been happening at peak periods (excluding covid) for around 9 years.

Summer 2015 with a throughput of roughly 3.5 million passengers was a real eye opener, crammed buses and an arrivals area so full they regularly had to limit the numbers entering! Some days it worked but one early or late flight and that was it for 2-3 hours as arrival after arrival piled in and the seemingly helpless ground teams treated it like damage limitation!

Been there done it now roll on the new arrivals hall!!

 

[AirBingley]

Just flew into LBA this evening on LS298 from Reus. 8 desks open in Reus, no queue for check in or security. Handy little airport with limited facilities but it means aircraft can be turned around swiftly without a long taxi or stack. Arrival at LBA ahead of schedule, bus to terminal. All 8 passport desks staffed by jolly staff, cases off as passengers cleared passport - LS even moved the bags to the biggest carousel as the airport quiet. Landed 18.30, in Guiseley 19.15.

The worst bit of the LBA was the poor management of the 1432 lounge which I covered last week. Everything else was spot on despite the out of date terminal!