Varsity Express – Another First?

March 8th, 2010

Unfortunately it looks as if the tiny airline formed at Oxford Airport to operate flights to Edinburgh and elsewhere might win the record of being Britain’s shortest-lived airline.

Many other airlines have failed to make it past the planning stages, and some of these have been little more than scams to get money from investors, but Varsity Express actually managed to operate services for a full week. A notice on their website today says that owing to a problem with the company sub-contracted to perform the flights, all services are suspended until further notice. They say they are attempting to find an alternative company.

We shall see.

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Oman Air claims first place with in-flight wifi

March 8th, 2010

Oman Air has become the world’s first long-haul airline to offer mobile phone access and broadband internet to its passengers in flight. The company has just announced that passengers can now use wifi internet and their mobile phones on its Muscat-Heathrow service, and is planning to extend the service to other routes.

Onboard communications will be charged by the home mobile service provider at international roaming rates, as is the case when using mobile phone abroad.

British Airways currently uses a similar but less versatile system on its London City – JFK premium service. At the other end of the market, Ryanair in Europe and US LLC Southwest are also ahead of the game in developing connectivity for their fleets.

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Air Asia brings its LLC concept to London hotels

March 4th, 2010

Tony Fernandes’ PR dept must be working overtime. Hard on the heals of reports that his long haul airline Air Asia X is scaling back the In-flight Entertainment offered on its planes, comes the news that this hyperactive entrepreneur plans to bring 1,500 new hotel rooms to the British capital.

Tune Hotels.com, part of the Tune Group, Mr Fernandes’ private investment outfit, has formed a strategic partnership  with London-based Queensway Group to invest in, develop and operate 15 hotels. The first example of its “five-star sleeping experience at a one-star price” is scheduled to open at 118 Westminster Bridge Road in the third quarter of this year. The company avoids gyms, conference facilities and up-market catering, and instead focuses on high quality basics such as comfy beds with en-suite power showers and a pay-as-you-use system of optional add-ons for energy-consuming amenities. As you’d expect, the best deals are available for those that book early, online.

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An Expensive Welcome

March 1st, 2010

The US Senate has just passed the Travel Promotion Act which will allow various schemes to go ahead all of which are designed to encourage visitors to come to the US and make them feel more welcome once they arrive. So far, so good.

It is intended that the scheme will be funded 50/50 by the government and the travel industry. The government will contribute $100m subject to businesses contributing another $100m. It is slightly unclear how the government will raise the money from the travel industry but, unfortunately, it is absolutely clear where the government’s own $100m will come from.

There will be a new $10 per person levy on visitors from most countries that are members of the visa-waiver programme.

So, we will be paying an extra $10 a head to be made to feel welcome.

Frankly, I would feel more welcome without yet another tax…

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This month’s route news

March 1st, 2010

Here’s a round-up of February’s route news and announcements.

British Isles: South-east Airports

AIR SEYCHELLES launches a weekly Seychelles-Gatwick service on 19th April. Its twice-weekly service to Heathrow remains.

BIMAN BANGLADESH has launched a thrice-weekly Dhaka-Heathrow service. The routing via Dubai continues to be operated twice weekly.

CONTINENTAL AIRLINES is adding a fourth daily service between Heathrow and Newark on 28th March, and a fifth will follow in October.

KINGFISHER AIRLINES launches a daily Delhi–Heathrow service on 28th March.

NORWEGIAN launches a six times-weekly Stockholm-Gatwick service on 29th April.

RYANAIR is launching services from Luton to Bratislava in April, and from Stansted to Fuerteventura, Fez and Figari in May.

TURKISH AIRLINES is increasing its Istanbul–Heathrow service from three to four daily on 28th March.

British Isles: Other Airports

AIRBALTIC is launching seasonal services from Vilnius to Manchester and Dublin at the end of March.

CIMBER STERLING launches a four times-weekly Billund-Dublin service on 31st March.

CSA CZECH AIRLINES resumes its Prague–Manchester service on 28th March, operated six days a week.

EASYJET launches a Liverpool-Isle of Man service on 21st May.

FLYBE is launching a six times-weekly year-round service between Manchester and Bournemouth on 27th May. It is also launching a daily summer-only service between Edinburgh and Manston on the same day. The carrier also plans a seasonal thrice-weekly Birmingham-Perpignan service for seven weeks from 13th July.

LUFTHANSA is introducing a six times-weekly services between Stuttgart and Manchester on 12th April, and between Dusseldorf and Edinburgh on 26th April.

NORWEGIAN launches a thrice-weekly Stockholm-Edinburgh service on 6th May.

RYANAIR is launching services from Bristol to Bydgoszcz and Kaunas in May, from Cork to Alicante, Arrecife, Bordeaux, Faro, La Rochelle, Malaga and Reus in June, and from Knock to Reus also in June.

VARSITY EXPRESS has launched a weekday service from Oxford to Edinburgh, and will launch a second via Newcastle starting on 5th April.

VIKING HELLAS has launched a thrice-weekly Athens-Manchester service. Frequency increases to four a week in March, and is scheduled to connect with the carrier’s services to Iraq.

Rest-of-World Developments

AEROLINEAS ARGENTINAS is transferring several services from Buenos Aires’ Ministro Pistarini airport to Jorge Newbery (Aeropark), which has until now only handled domestic and Uruguayan services. The transfer will take place on 14th March. Affected routes are to Florianopolis, Porto Alegre, Rio de Janeiro, Sao Paulo, and Santiago de Chile.

AEROMEXICO has cancelled its Mexico City–Montreal service and will operate its last Mexico City–Toronto service on 4th April, marking an end of the Skyteam carrier’s scheduled operation to Canada.

AIR CHINA has launched a twice-weekly Shanghai–Chengdu–Bangalore service.

AIR FRANCE launches a twice-weekly service to Bata, its second destination in Equatorial Guinea, via Malabo on 1st April.

AIRBALTIC launches a thrice-weekly Riga–Tehran service on 8th June.

ALITALIA is cancelling services from Milan (Malpensa) to Algiers, Istanbul, Kiev, Sofia, Tel Aviv and Tripoli on 28th March.

AUSTRIAN cancels its services to Ekaterinburg and Odessa on 28th March.

BA OPENSKIES launches a weekday Paris (Orly)–Washington (Dulles) service on 17th May.

CHINA EASTERN AIRLINES has launched a twice-weekly Kunming–Dhaka–Dubai service.

CSA CZECH AIRLINES launches a twice-weekly Prague–Astana service on 1st June.

HAINAN AIRLINES launches a thrice-weekly Shanghai–Brussels service on 28th May. However, planned increase on its Beijing–Brussels route from four a week to daily has been shelved.

IBERIA launches a twice-weekly Madrid-Amman service on 3rd July, and a weekly Madrid–Damascus service on 13th July.

JET AIRWAYS launches a daily Mumbai–Johannesburg service on 14th April.

KINGFISHER AIRLINES launches a six times-weekly Delhi–Hong Kong service on 7th April. It already operates a daily service from Mumbai.

PAKISTAN INTERNATIONAL AIRLINES is to resume services to Chicago in June.

PLUNA will launch a daily Montevideo–Buenos Aires Ministro Pistarini (Ezeiza) service on 5th April. This complements an up-to-11 times daily service to Buenos Aires Jorge Newbery (Aeropark).

ROYAL AIR MAROC launches services to Bangui and Pointe Noire at the end of March.

SWISS begins services from Zurich to Macedonia on 28th March – weekly to Ohrid and twice weekly to Skopje.

YAKUTIA is launching a four times-weekly seasonal service from Omsk to Hanover on 12th June.

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One Expert Opinion We Don’t Need

February 25th, 2010

I had thought that it was only the saintly Michael O’Leary of Ryanair whose opinion on all matters regarding aviation was to be regarded as infalliable but now it seems the Pope wants to get in on the act.

In a speech to Alitalia workers Pope Benedict XVI criticised the use of full-body scanners at airports and said it is important “to protect the human person in their integrity” and that “human dignity must be preserved”.

There are certainly questions to be answered about the use of full-body scanners:

- Do they actually give the full protection against smuggled objects that is promised?

- Do they pose any form of long-term health risk?

The jury is out on both questions and there are plenty of people who suggest the installation of these machines at UK airports was just a knee-jerk political stunt to show “government in action” but which fails to solve the problem. Hopefully, those questions will be answered in due course and it can be judged whether the machines have any benefit. However, the Pope’s intervention on the matter is thoroughly unhelpful.

Of course we should preserve “human dignity” but preserving life by making air travel safer takes precedent in any sane world. If – and it is a big if – these machines fulfill that purpose then travellers will just have to live with them.

The Pope seems to have copied Michael O’Leary’s tactic of making questionable comments to get publicity. Airline security is not a religious issue and relgious leaders should leave the matter to the experts.  If the Pope wants to get involved in aviation, maybe he should concentrate on praying for Alitalia’s revival.

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New UK airline slips under the radar – almost

February 24th, 2010

With very little publicity beyond the a story in the Oxford Mail, a couple of travel industry mags and blogs, and a short item in the Sunday Times business section, the UK begat a new airline earlier this month in the form of Varsity Express. Martin Halstead is the character behind the enterprise. Now 23, he was dubbed “Baby Branson” when at 19 he founded the short-lived Alpha One Airways. Hopes are higher for this new venture. Service kicks off with a weekday Oxford-Edinburgh service launching on 1st March, which goes to double weekday from 15th April,  the second flight routing via Newcastle. The opening offer is an all-in one-way fare of only £49. The pundits suspect that this will soon be going up given the constraints of the 15-seat Jetstream being used.

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Going to Bangkok this week?

February 23rd, 2010

Did you know that authorities in Bangkok are seriously concerned about the possibility of civil unrest in Bangkok?

The great British press is incredibly insular in its outlook. We have all the news we could possibly want about such surprising facts that wealthy footballers sometimes cheat on their wives, that Gordon Brown has a bad temper and that the Pope is celibate but when it comes to overseas news, there can be stunning silence. Even the terrible rail crash in Brussels last week failed to make most of the British front pages. The strange workings of politics in Thailand are most unlikely to appear even in the quality press – unless there is another airport blockade when you can be sure there will be non-stop coverage of plucky British tourists bemoaning their fate.

On 26th February the Supreme Court of Thailand is due to rule on the seizure of assets of the disgraced ex-Prime Minister, Thakan Shinowatra and it is feared this could be the trigger for widespread disturbance if supporters of the two opposing sides take to the streets. The Tourist Authority of Thailand is said to have made contingency plans and suggested that some local operators move tourists away from Bangkok. The Australian government has a travel advisory in place and there is a note on the Thailand page of the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office site (www.fco.gov.uk) but we imagine nearly all British travellers leaving for Thailand this week are doing so in ignorance. In general, we think it is always a good idea to take an occasional look at the FCO site and, when you are visiting a country outside Europe, it really does pay to do a quick Google search for the local English language newspapers and check the current news. Bangkok has two papers, The Nation and The Bangkok Post and even a cursory glance at either would have alerted you to the fact that “something is happening”.

We certainly cannot pretend to be experts in Thai politics and we would not wish to predict what might happen. However, experience suggests that when problems like this are anticipated, they fail to materialise. Bangkok is a very big city and  a small riot can be happening in one part of the city without impacting life in the rest of the city. It could be that the atmosphere in the streets might be a little tense and we imagine some of the night venues might close early. Somehow we doubt that protesters will try to blockade the airports again because this is an old trick and the authorities will be prepared. However, if the worst predictions do come true, we will find it a little difficult to have sympathy for stranded British tourists who haven’t bothered to do even the slightest homework on their destination.

Update:

Regardless of the Court’s verdict, supporters of the ex-Prime Minister intend to hold a rally in Bangkok on 14th March. They say up to a million people might descend on Bangkok from the countryside. Regardless of possible violence, this would seem like a day to avoid – Bangkok’s traffic is bad at the best of times.

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Qantas to scrap A380 First-class

February 18th, 2010

Despite this blog’s consistent evangelism for the future of First-class, news from Down Under suggests our confidence may be misplaced. This Qantas press release reports that the airline is to start removing first class cabins from its B747-400s and installing business class flatbed seats as used in its A380s from the end of 2011. The first 12 A380s in the fleet will keep First-class, but those being delivered from 2012 will have only economy, premium economy, and business classes.

Why this move? Well the explanation given is on the wooly side, but the nub of it is, according to CEO Alan Joyce that

“While some travel markets are recovering from the economic crisis, our assessment of longer term travel trends, which pre-dates the economic crisis, shows that international premium travel demand is changing.”

Meaning: while routes to London and Los Angeles will continue to offer First-class, don’t expect it to survive on any of their other services.

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Dubai digging a hole for itself – again!

February 18th, 2010

I doubt that any country in the world spends as much per head of the population on worthless PR as Dubai – and it is hard to think of any country that does such harm to its image when then things go wrong.

Watching the television news about the murder of a supposed terrorist in Dubai I was struck by the hopelessly incompetent way Dubai was handling the matter. Senior policeman were quoted as refusing to talk to the press and the Al Bustan Rotana Hotel tried to ban television crews from the premises.

No one is blaming Dubai for what happened. There is no question of bad security at the Al Bustan Rotana – no hotel in the world is going to be able to stop an international hit squad. Yet the more they hide from the issue, the more it looks as if they feel themselves to blame in some way.

When there was a case of plutonium poisoning by alleged Russian spies in London, police officers gave proper interviews to the press and the Millenium Hotel in Grosvenor Square allowed journalists full access.

It is frequently said that the Arabic mentality has a problem dealing with any form of negative news. The initial reaction is to deny or avoid the issue. Unfortunately this is at odds with Dubai’s aim to become “world class”. If you want to play with the big boys, you have to play to their rules and that means being rather more open when things do not go to plan.

The debt default by Dubai World earlier this year will go down as a classic in bad PR. They made a bad situation much worse by refusing to be open. Senior expats at Emirates did not help by foolishly suggesting that people were failing to understand the financial strength of Dubai.

What was there to misunderstand? A company linked to the government announces that it cannot pay its debts. That looks clear enough and does not indicate a country with massive hidden assets that foreigners are failing to appreciate.

Air France have won much praise from inside the PR industry for the way they handled the crash of their flight from Rio. Emirates have come within inches of having two major disasters of their own. One can only hope that their disaster planning is to world, rather than local standards.

Since the hotel that was the scene of the murder is so anxious to avoid publicity, here is a link to their website – www.rotana.com/property-9.htm

As they say, no publicity is bad publicity…

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