Aer Lingus Fleet/ Routes Discussion Pt 2 (ALL possible routes included)

I can only give my personal opinion based on how I think the market has changed in recent years but in short, I'd say no.

The gulf between Ryanair and Aer Lingus has been closing for many years, in fact it's now pretty much non-existent and both airlines offer identical products give or take a few minor details. It's how that product is delivered that counts for most passengers and Ryanair already performs better in this category; cheaper, more punctual and more effecient.

While a minority still say they prefer Aer Lingus and are happy to pay more for a perceived better service, the masses have and will continue to vote with their wallet and go with the best value offering which is usually Ryanair but often Aer Lingus as well.

After all, if passengers over the last 20 years were happy to accept the removal of Premier Europe, the introduction of buy on board catering, seat selection fees, bag charges, hand luggage limits, hand luggage fees, unbundled fares etc. ...the lack of headrests is unlikely to be the straw that breaks the camel's back.

Aer Lingus is also well aware of its limitations on short haul, its network is heavily focused on busy seasonal markets where there's enough demand to profitably sustain both airlines while also operating to traditional hubs that Ryanair so far continues to avoid bar one or two exceptions. This keeps short haul ticking over while long haul rakes in the profits.

There were a couple of years, around the time Christoph Mueller was in charge, that Aer Lingus outperformed Ryanair at Dublin. There were a few press releases about it at the time but it was soon forgotten, I’m guessing because they fell back down the rankings.

While Aer Lingus often ranks highly among European carriers, they don’t release monthly punctuality stats anymore while Ryanair continues to do so. According to Ryanair, they had an 86% on time record for June. That’s hard to beat.

That’s largely due to the Q1 loss with the increased seasonality of the business thanks to the slower recovery of business travel versus leisure. The Q2 profit of €121m is up considerably on the €112m from same quarter in 2019. Best margin of the group. On time performance was a poor 63% for the first half, second worst of the group after BA with its abysmal 57%, they really need to find out Iberia’s secret to consistent punctuality.

Overall I’d say that’s a pretty good performance. As usual the IAG results are very light on details of future plans, BA will get 10 more 787s, IB will get another A350, the group will see 10 more A32N added from 2028 etc.

Elsewhere Aer Lingus UK had a 64% load factor in May, down on the 72% in April but up considerably on the 56% for the same month last year. May was also the first full month of all A330 ops at the base so there was a huge increase in capacity on JFK to absorb. Not sure how sustainable all A330 ops will be for this base, particularly in the winter but it could simply be a case of them waiting it out until more narrow body capacity is made available.

I think the press release announcing their half year results sums it up. While the other group carriers reiterate upcoming fleet additions, product enhancements and routes, Aer Lingus can only promote an American football game they sponsor.

Priorities, at least publicly, seem to be muddled.

EI-NSC currently scheduled for Düsseldorf shortly. Hopefully the day spent in the hanger solved the issue.

Not unusual to have new aircraft experience teething problems, particularly when put to work on a busy route so quickly!

Flightradar24 shows what plane will operate what flight the day before and the full route plan for the plane for the day. This means that by about lunchtime you can usually work out which flights are going to run late, hours ahead of any announcement by EI. (It’s not perfect as they will often to a last minute switch when a plane is running late to get back on schedule)

i typically only fly to LHR on EI Mainline, which is essentially hourly, so if i spot my flight will be NSC, I plan to call and ask to switch to an earlier or later flight (I’m Concierge on EI, so same day flight changes are free).

fly with EI almost every week, so it’s worth the small effort of my part to do this to minimise the risk of delays. Their on time performance is appalling this year, so scraping out an hour or two every week like this adds up over time. Not sure I’d bother if I wasn’t flying constantly

Speaking of more planes, I saw an old fleet plan recently from around 2015-2016 which showed the airline had intended for 12 A321LR by 2022.

Obviously the pandemic interrupted things but the fact they had no options or at least haven’t been able/allowed to convert some is a shame, they’ve already had to cut back, postpone and juggle some routes due to this long range narrow body shortage. The likes of DUB-YUL/PIT and MAN-BOS could be operating this summer with that original plan.

Even with the arrival of the A321XLR, by the end of its delivery schedule they’ll only have two more transatlantic narrow bodies than they planned to have in 2022.

Overall, while there appears to have been route and capacity growth across the network, the fleet has remained at around 50 aircraft for the past ten years.

If CBP constraints becomes an issue to growth they could just operate some flights as non CBP and passengers would clear customs in the US

Absolutely it would not be ideal. But if it was between that and not expanding I’m sure they would pick to expand.

possibly Orlando could be non cbp as it’s more leisure based passengers. It doesn’t seem to bother people too much ex Manchester

The last thing parents with kids need after a 9 hr flight is a 60-90 minute wait with exhausted kids waiting to do CBP. I had to do it years ago ex uk and it’s no fun.

Any of the NEO trips should/could be CBP stateside due to lower pax numbers and arriving potentially in to smaller airports.