Friday, August 01, 2008

Belfast/Heathrow - Aer Lingus battling bmi?

Aer Lingus logo

From the Irish Independent (though I can’t find the content via their website - update - website has now caught up) ...

A YEAR after its controversial decision to switch Heathrow flights from Shannon to Belfast, Aer Lingus has cornered just 10% of the Belfast/London air market, new figures show ...

An Aer Lingus spokesman, however, defended his airline's Belfast/Heathrow performance, saying market share "wasn't the main consideration" and stressing the route's improving performance.

Industry figures from the UK's Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) show Aer Lingus carried about 87,000 passengers on the Belfast/Heathrow route between January and May ... less than 10pc of the total Belfast to London market, which came in at 888,000 for the five months.

Aer Lingus's sole competitor on the Heathrow route, BMI, meanwhile, carried almost 220,000 passengers during the same five months this year.” ...

The latest figures, for July, show Aer Lingus's Belfast/Heathrow planes were almost 75pc full ...

But considering that on weekdays bmi are running eight flights each direction between Belfast City and London Heathrow, compared to Aer Lingus’ three flights a day, it’s not too bad a performance.

Wonder what bmi's passenger volume was for the first five months of 2007?

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

BMI carried 220,000 passengers in the same period. They have directly lost 87,000 to Aer Lingus on that route and I would say that Aer Lingus will continue to build on that figure and take more when the route is established for longer, its a good performance considering they operate 4 flights a day compared to BMI's 8 flights each way. Aer Lingus Belfast base across the board is doing better that expected - so lets see how the future goes......