Aer Lingus Fleet/Routes Discussion

Idbatterim

I wonder if EI would be interested in the now empty Thomas Cook Las Vegas slots. They could do a connection from the UK & have all passengers do immigration & customs in Dublin. They already fly to all the other US locations, so I doubt they'd be interested in increasing frequency.

Interesting! Ill leave my input at that though

Tenger

Jack1985 wrote: »

.......
DUB-BDL - Mon, Wed, Fri, Sun
DUB-EWR - Tu, Thu, Sat
DUB-PHL - Daily Service
SNN-BOS - Daily service

So the 3rd A321LR will be delivered within 5 weeks.

I had looked at the website about a month ago and it was showing DUB-IAD 3 times a week. Just looking there I see BDL is dropping to 4x weekly and that EWR is showing daily. So will be interesting to hear how the alternate aircraft works out on that route over the winter.


As for the gap left by Thomas Cook. This will certainly change the EI plans if they see a opportunity to make a profit on a niche route that they previously operate. So perhaps LAS is now looking like a better route, or even a Caribbean destination that TCX previously served.

basill

The problem has always been that when destinations go above a flight time of approximately 9.5-10hrs then it necessitates 2 airframes to operate a route. If it isn't daily then you can end up with aircraft sitting around not earning. Throw into the mix seasonality (more of an issue on the leisure routes) and they don't look as attractive from an overall yield perspective over a year. The single airframe proposition with a European tag on is the ideal earner as the assets are "sweated".

alancostello

basill wrote: »

The problem has always been that when destinations go above a flight time of approximately 9.5-10hrs then it necessitates 2 airframes to operate a route. If it isn't daily then you can end up with aircraft sitting around not earning. Throw into the mix seasonality (more of an issue on the leisure routes) and they don't look as attractive from an overall yield perspective over a year. The single airframe proposition with a European tag on is the ideal earner as the assets are "sweated".

To be fair only one or two aircraft actually do the flights to Malaga/Faro out of 13 A330s (and soon to be 17). With a fleet that large you don't actually have to dedicate two (or any) aircraft to the route, an A330 that comes in pre 6am from ORD/BOS/JFK takes off for LAS at 10am or 11am, arrives back shortly after noon the following day and then does one of the late departures to ORD/BOS/JFK, rinse and repeat. This is exactly how they operate LAX, SFO, and SEA and it's incredibly effective scheduling.

cson

OU812 wrote: »

I wonder if EI would be interested in the now empty Thomas Cook Las Vegas slots. They could do a connection from the UK & have all passengers do immigration & customs in Dublin. They already fly to all the other US locations, so I doubt they'd be interested in increasing frequency.

LAS isn't LHR, it doesn't have capacity issues that would make slot pairings worth anything.

Captain_Crash

So word on the street is LRB is covered in dents and EI are not happy with it! Can anyone confirm?

Source who told me said he was told by an engineer who’s been with it, but admittedly it’s second hand information!

kevinandrew

Where are these supposed dents located, fuselage, engine or cabin? 

Would have thought anything major would have picked up during the delivery process, must be some sort of inspection before hand over.

Lapmo_Dancer

Tenger wrote: »

I had looked at the website about a month ago and it was showing DUB-IAD 3 times a week. Just looking there I see BDL is dropping to 4x weekly and that EWR is showing daily. So will be interesting to hear how the alternate aircraft works out on that route over the winter.

The original Nov/Dec schedule had a daily IAD and a daily EWR.

IAD was to be x4 weekly 330 and x3 weekly 321.
EWR was to be daily 330.

Schedule has been modified to still a daily fight to both with a daily 330 to IAD and EWR getting x4 weekly 330 and x3 weekly 321.

Captain_Crash

kevinandrew wrote: »

Where are these supposed dents located, fuselage, engine or cabin? 

Would have thought anything major would have picked up during the delivery process, must be some sort of inspection before hand over.

That was my thought! I asked and the answer I got was supposedly it looks like it was sat in a hail storm! I know nothing more and just posting here what I was told (source is fairly reliable, but again full disclosure, he hasn’t seen it and was only told about it)

Qprmeath

The new bus

sandbelter

Captain_Crash wrote: »

So word on the street is LRB is covered in dents and EI are not happy with it! Can anyone confirm?

Source who told me said he was told by an engineer who’s been with it, but admittedly it’s second hand information!

You bet your bottom dollar that Airbus wouldn't deliver anything with dents to Qatar Airways.

kevinandrew

Captain_Crash wrote: »

kevinandrew wrote: »

Where are these supposed dents located, fuselage, engine or cabin? 

Would have thought anything major would have picked up during the delivery process, must be some sort of inspection before hand over.

That was my thought! I asked and the answer I got was supposedly it looks like it was sat in a hail storm! I know nothing more and just posting here what I was told (source is fairly reliable, but again full disclosure, he hasn’t seen it and was only told about it)

That’s believable to be honest, the aircraft on the production line at the Hamburg plant can spend a number of weeks outside in parking areas between hanger time. I believe this time outside has been longer than normal this year as Airbus get to grips with complexities on the NEO line.

Germany also gets its fair share of intense thunderstorms during the late summer. Many of them bring large hail, straight line winds and even the odd tornado. It’s often more reminiscent of the US Midwest than Western Europe!

Not saying this is proof of anything but it wouldn’t surprise me as much.

flange888

Captain_Crash wrote:

So word on the street is LRB is covered in dents and EI are not happy with it! Can anyone confirm?

Not accurate

Captain_Crash

flange888 wrote: »

Not accurate

Sound! Good news

Do you know if there is any issues or was it just an unfounded rumor?

Karl8415

Considering that EI have new 330's due soon would there ever be a market for them to introduce premium economy seating to generate extra revenue or will they alway have business and economy only

Nijmegen

Karl8415 wrote: »

Considering that EI have new 330's due soon would there ever be a market for them to introduce premium economy seating to generate extra revenue or will they alway have business and economy only

Premium economy would be a good fit, it's where a lot of the market is heading towards to drive margin. A lot of biz travellers don't have the policies to support business class travel but their companies will do premium economy and a lot of wealthier / older travellers will go premium economy. There's some interesting graphs here on the YoY growth rate of the seats, and it has really taken off in recent years. Allows you to continue to strip back and offer the barebones down the back to win the Skyscanner battles and then drive more premium margin in the middle vs relying for it all right up the front.

California Dreamer

On the old business configuration on the 300's there was a small 'mini cabin' between business and economy that was talked about to change to PE. Nothing ever came of it though.

flange888

Captain_Crash wrote:

Do you know if there is any issues or was it just an unfounded rumor?

No issues... there's always a snag list during delivery of an aircraft, sometimes they are quite extensive and sometimes much shorter, its common for an airline to have question mark's over certain items

Karl8415

T

Nijmegen wrote: »

Premium economy would be a good fit, it's where a lot of the market is heading towards to drive margin. A lot of biz travellers don't have the policies to support business class travel but their companies will do premium economy and a lot of wealthier / older travellers will go premium economy. There's some interesting graphs here on the YoY growth rate of the seats, and it has really taken off in recent years. Allows you to continue to strip back and offer the barebones down the back to win the Skyscanner battles and then drive more premium margin in the middle vs relying for it all right up the front.

Thank you for your reply and I appreciate it,I asked my question because I’m watching a lot of new aircraft deliveries with different airlines with different manufacturers and the vast amount of them seem to be going down this road of premium economy, now I know that EI 330-300’s has either 283 or 287 in economy pending on MTOW variant but I just wonder if they were to experiment with converting a few economy rows into premium with a new cabin that they would increase the gross revenue that the aircraft would generate, it might not happen with the 2 pending 300’s that are due but I wonder would they consider it as the current 200’s get replaced with 300 series

alancostello

Karl8415 wrote: »

T
Thank you for your reply and I appreciate it,I asked my question because I’m watching a lot of new aircraft deliveries with different airlines with different manufacturers and the vast amount of them seem to be going down this road of premium economy, now I know that EI 330-300’s has either 283 or 287 in economy pending on MTOW variant but I just wonder if they were to experiment with converting a few economy rows into premium with a new cabin that they would increase the gross revenue that the aircraft would generate, it might not happen with the 2 pending 300’s that are due but I wonder would they consider it as the current 200’s get replaced with 300 series

If EI get added to the transatlantic joint venture they’ll roll it out as they'll want consistent product offerings across participating brands. They’ll remove the first 4-6 rows of economy and replace it with 3-4 rows of PE in a 2-3-2 similar to what American has on its A330s.

sherology

alancostello wrote: »

If EI get added to the transatlantic joint venture they’ll roll it out as they'll want consistent product offerings across participating brands. They’ll remove the first 4-6 rows of economy and replace it with 3-4 rows of PE in a 2-3-2 similar to what American has on its A330s.

Were it me, I'd add the same PE seat (if they do retrofit the class) to the a321/320 fleet, on a 3-2 configuration, ~5 rows, and sell that as AerSpace/Priority (route dependent) - not a huge reduction in seat count - and give the folks connecting and those who pay for all the bells and whistles on short haul a little differentiation. A lot of folks buy all those bells and whistles, and would likely pay that bit more for some extra comfort and the felling of separation.

Not me... I'm a total cheap skate, but I do notice the priority line on flights.

I'd like EI to become more boutique, and lead a bit more. Seems the right size for this type of product. Full biz on certain early morning trunk routes - as planned, and PE available on the others... So people are never totally disappointed by what they get for their higher fares.

alancostello

sherology wrote: »

Were it me, I'd add the same PE seat (if they do retrofit the class) to the a321/320 fleet, on a 3-2 configuration, ~5 rows, and sell that as AerSpace/Priority (route dependent) - not a huge reduction in seat count - and give the folks connecting and those who pay for all the bells and whistles on short haul a little differentiation. A lot of folks buy all those bells and whistles, and would likely pay that bit more for some extra comfort and the felling of separation.

Not me... I'm a total cheap skate, but I do notice the priority line on flights.

I'd like EI to become more boutique, and lead a bit more. Seems the right size for this type of product. Full biz on certain early morning trunk routes - as planned, and PE available on the others... So people are never totally disappointed by what they get for their higher fares.

While a nice idea, it'll never happen for a variety or reasons, not least among them that PE seats wouldn't fit in a 3-2 config. American use an identical seat for PE and Domestic First, 2-3-2 or 2-4-2 on wide bodies (A330/787 and 777, respectively), and 2-2 on all narrowbody aircraft.

All AerSpace ever will be is a blocked middle seat same as literally every other premium Euro airline does. The only development that'll happen is a divider and changeable cabin size.

Kcormahs

alancostello wrote: »

While a nice idea, it'll never happen for a variety or reasons, not least among them that PE seats wouldn't fit in a 3-2 config. American use an identical seat for PE and Domestic First, 2-3-2 or 2-4-2 on wide bodies (A330/787 and 777, respectively), and 2-2 on all narrowbody aircraft.

All AerSpace ever will be is a blocked middle seat same as literally every other premium Euro airline does. The only development that'll happen is a divider and changeable cabin size.

I didnt hear about divider/curtain or meal improvement. You just presuming this or have you heard anything?

alancostello

Kcormahs wrote: »

I didnt hear about divider/curtain or meal improvement. You just presuming this or have you heard anything?

Never mentioned anything about meal improvement? A divider/changeable cabin size is inevitable, likely just something that sticks on top of seats, it'll have to be in order to compete. They're trialling it with Row 1 for now but of course they'll need more, especially on likes of the LHR/CDG/AMS flights.

Kcormahs

alancostello wrote: »

Never mentioned anything about meal improvement? A divider/changeable cabin size is inevitable, likely just something that sticks on top of seats, it'll have to be in order to compete. They're trialling it with Row 1 for now but of course they'll need more, especially on likes of the LHR/CDG/AMS flights.

There are already seat headrests to divide aer space from economy.
Comparing to every single competitor on short haul with a premium cabin, the product is low as its only the same food as in the economy menu. Not a real meal life BA/LH/AF/KL etc

sdanseo

New A333s can't be far away now surely? Anyone know ETAs?

This pic was 2 months ago: https://aibfamily.flights/customer/Aer-Lingus/A330

EI-EIM and EI-EIN. Will the next be EI-EIO or are they going to (logically) skip it?

Irish Steve

EI-EIO is unlikely to be allocated to an A330, as it was used a long time ago on a Seneca (light twin), and unless the policy about reallocations has changed, that will mean it can't be reused.

HTCOne

EI-EIN? That's quite a coincidence, both designators in the reg.

L1011

Irish Steve wrote: »

EI-EIO is unlikely to be allocated to an A330, as it was used a long time ago on a Seneca (light twin), and unless the policy about reallocations has changed, that will mean it can't be reused.

The ability to bend the rules when required (EI-ABI...) is presumably still there?

kevinandrew

Next A330 is due sometime in November isn't it? 

No sign of new transatlantic routes, not ever a whisper. Could the increased risk of a no deal Brexit and its impact on our own economy be playing a part?