I would have said they probably have a lot to lose as they’d need to reconfigure the whole hub. For example the first wave of all the flights to europe depart Dublin 06:00 to 08;00, which is the same time as the regional flights are heading over to the uk. So you need to base the aircraft in the uk, fly them over to DUB early morning and you’ve then messed up the a whole idea of connecting to the US flights. Of course you could operate a very dense schedule where you have aircraft based in LBA and DUB flying say 6 x daily but then more seats to fill and you’d need to repeat that at all the other uk departure points, so more aircraft, pilots, crew needed.
Airlines will usually talk about returns on investment or capital or operating margin rather than a £ value per aircraft. £3 million is great if you invested £1 million to earn it. If you invested £100 million, then it’s worse than just putting the money in the bank. All the data suggests Aer Lingus uk was generating a return well below peers in the IAG stable and below their 12-15% target. When that happens most businesses would logically look at the detailed performance data and make an assessment of how feasible it would be to drive an improvement or whether to just shift the aircraft somewhere else. Thats the thing with planes, they are the most mobile asset there is. An underperforming factory is very hard to move - 2 x A330s, very easy.
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