Aer Lingus to get an A380 ? Willie says why not

WheatenBriar

So which route?
We know the runway can take it

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/a380-could-work-for-iag-at-iberia-and-aer-lingus-w-424428/

FridaysWell

WheatenBriar wrote: »

So which route?
We know the runway can take it

https://www.flightglobal.com/news/articles/a380-could-work-for-iag-at-iberia-and-aer-lingus-w-424428/

Boston, JFK, any of the connection heavy flights.

Shannon757

It would need a new livery, maybe a retro one to work.

Don't mind that that's an old livery.

sandbelter

I would imagine ears are picking up at Boeing and a couple of leasing companies as well. Don't be surprised of the B77W end up in the mix at some stage.

This is effectively the opening shot, a request for proposals if you like, to see what works. Could be years off anything happening.....anyway Airliners.net haven't been so excited since they saw B757 and NEO in the same sentence.

Personally I think a 7-8pm ex DUB departure bank may be more lucrative.

Noxegon

sandbelter wrote: »

Personally I think a 7-8pm ex DUB departure bank may be more lucrative.

Agreed. For me it's like the daytime back from JFK – I like arriving where I'm supposed to be around bed time so I can be functional the next day.

That's why I like the current Ethiopian return from LAX so much.

arubex

Surely EI-BIG...?

john boye

FridaysWell wrote: »

Boston, JFK, any of the connection heavy flights.

Am sure I read somewhere that Boston can't take the 380 and they have no interest in doing so. Emirates have been pushing them hard on it to no avail

sjb25

arubex wrote: »

Surely EI-BIG...?

St notorious

homerjay2005

WheatenBriar wrote: »

So which route?
We know the runway can take it

wonder would they consider Dublin-New York-LA/San Fran in one go?

Shannon757

sjb25 wrote: »

St notorious

Nah Planey McPlaneface

Shannon757

Shannon757 wrote: »

Nah Planey McPlaneface

exaisle

sjb25 wrote: »

St notorious

St Upendous....

Noxegon

arubex wrote: »

Surely EI-BIG...?

I like the idea of EI-BFP myself...

Oscar Bravo

flew in that very reg years ago, it was a Rallye aircraft based in Coonagh,Limerick. EI-BFP

cuterob

EI-BFG

Comhrá

EI-XXL

Tenger

homerjay2005 wrote: »

wonder would they consider Dublin-New York-LA/San Fran in one go?

No chance. Why combine 2 direct flights into one when you can fill both direct?
EI are already filling 2x A330 and a B757 during peak season on DUB- SFO/JFK.
Adding a stop in JFK enroute to West Coast adds landing charges, burns fuel, adds crew hours, increases chances of disruptions, adds complexities, etc

munchkin_utd

Also, DUB to SFO goes nowhere near new york as it goes much farther north over Greenland and then enters the USA well west of Chicago.
https://uk.flightaware.com/live/flight/EIN147/history/20160502/1130Z/EIDW/KSFO

Dublin SFO is 8204km direct whereas its 9277km via JFK

ozzy jr

OK, this is highly unlikely to happen,

BUT,

Let's just say EI got their hands on an A380, could it possibly work on one of the US routes? Would they have the business class and economy numbers to fill one of these planes, or nearly fill it, every day?

Shannon757

ozzy jr wrote: »

OK, this is highly unlikely to happen,

BUT,

Let's just say EI got their hands on an A380, could it possibly work on one of the US routes? Would they have the business class and economy numbers to fill one of these planes, or nearly fill it, every day?

Will they have First class?, A residence suite? So many questions.

Tenger

ozzy jr wrote: »

....
Let's just say EI got their hands on an A380, could it possibly work on one of the US routes? Would they have the business class and economy numbers to fill one of these planes, or nearly fill it, every day?

DUB-JFK already see's A330 nearly year round. so that would be the obvious option. No bother to them to fill an A380 daily during peak season on Dub-ORD, DUB-BOS or even DUB-SFO. (peak season being approx 12 weeks)

The whole comments on Mr Walsh's statement are missing the point a little about the A380's. It wouldn't be "EI operating a single A380". It would be IAG operating a fleet of 15-20 A380's, with 4-5 being seasonally allocated to IB/EI routes"

Irish Steve

And to add fuel to the fire, there's no indication yet of what plans IAG may have for increasing the number of people that are hubbing through Dublin, there's plenty of European airports that could provide additional numbers to help increase the load factor on a 380, (now really living dangerously) always assuming that it's Dublin they decide to use for the hub.

As I've mentioned previously, and been abused for doing so, the Irish Airports are ideally placed to enable (with good ground handling on the turn) 2 airframes providing 3 flights a day across to the East Coast. That's 33% more utilisation than can be achieved on other routes or hubs, and may be an interesting option if the right feeder services are put in place to provide the load factors.

Noxegon

Irish Steve wrote: »

As I've mentioned previously, and been abused for doing so, the Irish Airports are ideally placed to enable (with good ground handling on the turn) 2 airframes providing 3 flights a day across to the East Coast. That's 33% more utilisation than can be achieved on other routes or hubs, and may be an interesting option if the right feeder services are put in place to provide the load factors.

I presume you mean three one way flights, right? Even still I find it difficult to see how you'd do that without crazy scheduling. Assuming a two hour turnaround and a completely antisocial 3:00am departure from JFK you'd still end up out of whack.

0600 DUB arr 0800 JFK -> 1000 JFK arr 2100 DUB -> 2300 DUB arr 0100 JFK
0300 JFK arr 1400 DUB -> 1600 DUB arr 1800 JFK -> 2000 JFK arr 0700 DUB

Am I missing something?

Irish Steve

The reason for 2 airframes is to ensure same time departures each day, the round trip times don't work for the same airframe to operate at the same times each day in this scenario. I've not worked out the best times, that will also be determined by the feeder services that would be essential to get the load factors that are essential to success. With the right pricing and connections, I suspect it would be viable.

Then, just to be controversial, at certain times of the year, I have to wonder if a 380 Orlando service could work, with the right feeder routes providing the load factor,

duskyjoe

Willy waving by Willy pardon the pun......there is no way on gods earth a 380 will be part of a peripheral airline on a iag spreadsheet.

Rawr

arubex wrote: »

Surely EI-BIG...?

EI-MOR ? ;D

sully2010

How hard can it be to fill an A380 if Ryanair are providing plenty of feeder traffic. Sure why not go for 2 of them:pac:

http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/former-arch-rivals-aer-lingus-and-ryanair-set-to-reach-deal-walsh-34689022.html

Larbre34

EI BIG, EI-MOR and EI-BFG are all available, unfortunately EI-FAT is not!

Lennoxschips

Willy Walsh in the Irish Times today saying that DUB is at capacity in terms aircraft stands at peak hours.

Never understood myself the short term thinking that went into building T2. Tear down six existing gates and spend 600 million building a new terminal building with a pier with 15 or so gates. So the net gain is only 9 gates, and they've built the terminal in a part of the airport where expansion is very difficult.

They should have started from scratch about 20 years ago with a modular midfield terminalmasterplan in the style of e.g. Oslo airport or Heathrow T5. Loads of space to the west of the airport buildings...

Locker10a

sully2010 wrote: »

How hard can it be to fill an A380 if Ryanair are providing plenty of feeder traffic. Sure why not go for 2 of them:pac:

http://www.independent.ie/business/irish/former-arch-rivals-aer-lingus-and-ryanair-set-to-reach-deal-walsh-34689022.html

If it happened that there was a interline agreement between the two airlines, it would create a major potential hub in DUB, and I believe EI could fill aircraft larger than the 757 and A330 with feed from the european ryanair market

J.pilkington

Also need to remember 2 factors why Dublin is doing so good at the moment, both of which are not long term / and can't be relied on
- US pre-clearance which will be rolled out to other countries in the coming years
- Uk long haul departure tax which could dissappear overnight, airports like Manchester / Edinburgh / Londons are losing a lot of business to this tax at the moment

corsav6

Larbre34 wrote: »

EI BIG, EI-MOR and EI-BFG are all available, unfortunately EI-FAT is not!

EI-WHY?

Rawr

corsav6 wrote: »

EI-WHY?

If they get 2:

EI-WHY
EI-NOT

Lennoxschips

It's Ryanair and IAG teaming up to take out Norwegian.

The enemy of my enemy is my friend and all that.

DUB should have been developed into a hub years ago. Ireland is in the perfect position to be a transatlantic hub. The government missed a trick.

L1011

J.pilkington wrote: »

Also need to remember 2 factors why Dublin is doing so good at the moment, both of which are not long term / and can't be relied on
- US pre-clearance which will be rolled out to other countries in the coming years
- Uk long haul departure tax which could dissappear overnight, airports like Manchester / Edinburgh / Londons are losing a lot of business to this tax at the moment

CBP is impractical to roll out to the existing large hubs due to the need to have one post CBP area/terminal. The re-engineering required for LHR/AMS/etc would be off the scale.

APD going will have an impact but you're massively overstating it. Lack of capacity at LHR means there's virtually no domestic connections anymore - and they don't take the train, they go via AMS or DUB and actually still pay the APD as a UK origin flight. The number of self connections is low.

Jamie2k9

Also need to remember 2 factors why Dublin is doing so good at the moment, both of which are not long term / and can't be relied on
- US pre-clearance which will be rolled out to other countries in the coming years
- Uk long haul departure tax which could dissappear overnight, airports like Manchester / Edinburgh / Londons are losing a lot of business to this tax at the moment

USPC is over rated and most connecting passengers will agree with me
If the UK drop taxes then EI can cut prices as well as they pay a sizable amount of tax as connections are charged also.

The_Wanderer

Jamie2k9 wrote: »

USPC is over rated and most connecting passengers will agree with me
If the UK drop taxes then EI can cut prices as well as they pay a sizable amount of tax as connections are charged also.

Eh why?

I wouldn't fly any other way to the USA. Best thing since sliced bread is USPC. Being able to walk off the plane after several hours of being cooped up and straight to your hotel (once bag collected of course) is a huge plus!

Jamie2k9

The_Wanderer wrote: »

Eh why?

I wouldn't fly any other way to the USA. Best thing since sliced bread is USPC. Being able to walk off the plane after several hours of being cooped up and straight to your hotel (once bag collected of course) is a huge plus!

It's good but not wonderful, waiting in DUB can be pretty bad at times as well and the big long queue's we hear about in the US don't impact the majority.

The bulk of EI passengers were not clearing when they started hubbing so it's no a major driving factor in connections.

The_Wanderer

Jamie2k9 wrote: »

It's good but not wonderful, waiting in DUB can be pretty bad at times as well and the big long queue's we hear about in the US don't impact the majority.

The bulk of EI passengers were not clearing when they started hubbing so it's no a major driving factor in connections.

For something like that you expect a Q. The last time I was there my other half and I were split up into different Q's. She flew through and my Q was rather slow being processed by the two (IIRC) agents dealing with the Q I was in.

By the time I arrived at the agent and he asked all the questions he found out I was interested in railways (you know why) and then started talking about US railways and trips he would love to do over there. Meanwhile I was rather conscious of the large Q behind me and was trying to finish the conversation as fast as I could! Nice guy though.

But to get back on track, a friend of mine who lives in LA always flies home LAX - LHR - DUB and back to the USA via DUB - JFK - LAX, reason being the USPC. I must ask him would the new EI service tempt him.

Jamie2k9

The_Wanderer wrote: »

For something like that you expect a Q. The last time I was there my other half and I were split up into different Q's. She flew through and my Q was rather slow being processed by the two (IIRC) agents dealing with the Q I was in.

By the time I arrived at the agent and he asked all the questions he found out I was interested in railways (you know why) and then started talking about US railways and trips he would love to do over there. Meanwhile I was rather conscious of the large Q behind me and was trying to finish the conversation as fast as I could! Nice guy though.

But to get back on track, a friend of mine who lives in LA always flies home LAX - LHR - DUB and back to the USA via DUB - JFK - LAX, reason being the USPC. I must ask him would the new EI service tempt him.

My main point was once it happens at other Euro airports I don't see it impacting at DUB whatsoever in terms of traffic.

Blut2

I completely disagree about USPC being overrated. I went through a period of regular (2x monthly) journeys to Chicago/NYC from Dublin a few years ago and without fail every time I tried the journey via a European connection I ended up in a 60min+ queue on arrival in America. The queue at DUB, and the agents themselves, are far far more pleasant to deal with than their counterparts in JFK or ORD. I can't speak to other major US hub airports, but it would surprise me if they were dissimilar.

I know a number of friends and colleagues who would have had similar experiences, too. Almost all now travel from DUB to America directly if they can because of USPC.

J.pilkington

Two further points where I see dublins USP being further eroded,

The new self service machines(you enter all your info take photos, finger pronts and bring the ticket to the agent) which were recently installed in Dublin are also in most intl airports in the US now (some have walls lined with them) so your interaction time with the agents is much reduced. This obviously doesn't solve the customs issue.

The US Pre clearance system is going to be rolled out to other European airports (already identified)

Tenger

US CBP pre-clearance is in the process of being approved for other airports but I cannot see it happening anywhere in Europe for another 2-3 years at a minimum. Dublin T2 was designed from scratch with a dedicated CBP facility. Pre-clearance requires specific security cordons/protocols in place. Trying to implement that into an existing International Terminal would be problematic at best.

While I agree that pre-clearance is not the major reason for the current success of the 'DUB hub', it does contribute (along with terminal location, ease of connection time, frequency of flights and pricing)

Lennoxschips

I fly to IAH two or three times a year from the Netherlands and never waited longer than ten minutes at immigration and never longer than one minute at customs.

It's possible that I've been very lucky.

I choose my flights based on the price of the ticket.

goingnowhere

CBP in Dublin is by far the most friendly I have experienced.

The roll out of the self service machines has made life a lot better at all ports of entry. The time you wait is really a function of where you arrive and what has landed before you.

E.g. Seattle is great if you arrive on the BA49 as the CBP area is empty at 1630 local, arrive 2 hours earlier and it might not be so much fun.

The fact EI now offer connections at SFO, JFK & BOS that do not require you to pass through security again is also a huge selling point