It’s that time again to stow your tray tables, clip your seatbelts together, and pay attention to the safety video.

This week, it’s a Swiss’s safety onboard their A330.

More next week!

Once again, someone is smoking something good at Donnington Hall with the formal announcement that BMI will be commencing a service from London to Tripoli, Libya.

They will join British Airways and Libyan Airlines who fly from Heatrow, and Air Afriqiyah from Gatwick.

Seemly, the route has been introduced due to the oil and gas sector which BMI is building a little niche to itself serving countries that have a lot of traffic in and out of them.

Initial timings and equipment have been announced… and it’s not hilarious.

DEP    TIME    ARV    TIME    FLIGHT NO    EQUP   RUNS

LHR    0855    TIP    1330    BD469        319    1234567

TIP    1415    LHR    1650    BD470        319    1234567

For those of you who can’t read airline, it’s 7 days a week, with an Airbus A319 to take you there – with the varity of Business Class configurations (or lack of thereafter). Whilst in distance terms, it’s no further than Athens, it is in a much higher redemption category that Europe, making a trip on BMI Diamond Club Miles an expensive proposition. 

Revenue fares start at £265 for an economy return. 

Whilst an interesting route there are going to be a few questions asked including how long is this route sustainable, and more importantly, what route is being dropped or reduced to allow this flight to run?

Hot off the heels of the news British Airways is heading to Toyko Haneda, is one that is slightly less impressive, but perhaps a lot more locally important.

Air Asia X is joining in the fray connecting Kuala Lumpur to Toyko Haneda with a low cost entry.

They will be offering a 3 times a week service, using A330 aircraft, fitted with “Premium FlatBed seats” which have a 60-inch pitch.

Which is nice.

As more carriers are approved for travel into HND, it is going turn into a very interesting battle who will “dominate” the airport, and who can make use of the existing domestic connections.

This is shaping up to be *very* interesting.

It seems Lufthansa is still trying to get their pilots trained on A380′s, and have announced more odd deployments of the the WhaleJet.

This time, the A380′s are off to get some sun in Mallorca during next month.

Times and dates are

Date     DEP FRA   ARV PMI

02/10/10 09:20      11:20

03/10/10 08:45      15:00

Return flights

Time     DEP PMI   ARV FRA

02/10/10 17:30     19:45

03/10/10 17:30     19:45

So if you fancy a day trip to Mallorca, it’s

• €99 in economy,
• €399 in business
• €999 in first class

HOWEVER – don’t expect to take a big suitcase with you if you want a longer break – Lufthansa are restricting baggage to HAND BAGGAGE ONLY on these flights.

Normal routes for Lufthansa’s A380′s are Tokyo, Beijing and Johannesburg.

Long live the crazy deployments!

News flies in from Austraila of the proposed alliance with Virgin Blue Group and Eithad has been approved by the Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC).

The upshot of the decision is that the two companies are allowed to cooperate on pricing and scheduling between the two networks, and new services from Sydney-Abu Dhabi and Brisbane-Abu Dhabi in the future.

The aim is for Etihad and V Australia to offer 27 weekly services between Abu Dhabi and Australia over the next few years from major centres (Sydney, Melborne, Brisbane), with connections to 65 destinations from Abu Dhabi and 45 destinations from Virgin Blue hubs.

An interesting play – and one to annoy Qantas as they have an existing relationship with Eithad. One to watch in the next few months….

It’s confirmed that S7 Airlines will be formally joining the OneWorld Alliance on the 15th November and gaining full membership of the alliance.

It’s been some time since S7 declared their interest, and a slow slog to membership (although faster than Air India joining Star Alliance it seems), but from the go date, OneWorld Code-shares, privileges and benefits will apply.

S7 chief Vladimir Obyedkov states:

“It will enable us to offer our customers a truly global network served by partners who include some of the best-known and most-admired airlines in the world,” says


“It will also strengthen us financially, through revenues from passengers transferring to our network from our Oneworld partners and the cost reduction opportunities the alliance offers.”

Of course, dates are to join are normally held close, so lets thank Royal Jordan Airlines for blabbing to the press.

S7 are based at Moscow Domodedovo (DME), with services to 90 destinations (45 domestic).

So whilst Aeroflot has been a long standing member of SkyTeam and S7 joining OneWorld, where does this leave Star Alliance?

Up a creak, sans paddle.

Currently, Star Alliance hubs via alternative points to reach Russia and destinations in the region. However, they have no partner there. And two of the brides are now wedded…

It seems that another airline in the USA has finally got a clue and is giving up drink tokens – or the silly “buy a drink” routine.

Step forward American Airlines.

Visitors to Admirals Club lounges inside the USA will be able to have free alcoholic drinks just like they do when you travel internationally.

This goes forward from 1st October.

Of course, this is not all alcoholic drinks – they will (like Continental) offer “Premium” drinks for purchase as well.

And lord help you if you dare to leave the bar without a tip.

Still it’s a positive move that will hopefully spread to other airlines. And yes, I am looking at you United….

From I Can Has Cheezburger…

Remeber – never annoy the pilot

http://icanhascheezburger.com/2010/09/21/funny-pictures-temporarily-grounded/

Time for some good BA News.

British Airways has announced new routes and frequency upgrades today with:

South America:
London Heathrow – Buenos Aires – Now a Direct flight as opposed to a stop in San Paulo (with both having direct flights daily)

Caribbean:
London Gatwick to Barbados will increase from 10 to 12 flights a week
London Gatwick to Antigua will increase from five to six services a week
London Gatwick to St Lucia will increase to daily flights from five a week.

Mexico:
London Gatwick to Cancun, (set to be launched in November 2010), will have it’s freqncy increased from 2 to 3 services a week

United States of America:
London Gatwick to Tampa FL will increase from five to seven flights a week
London Gatwick to Orlando FL will drop from nine to seven flights a week.

All the changes above commence 27th March 2011.

Japan – The star addition to the new route list.
London Heathrow to Tokyo Haneda will start 19 February 2011, and operate five days a week with a Four Class 777 (First, Club World, World Traveller Plus and World Traveller), give BA a direct link into HND, and JAL’s local network to expand into.

Operational details:

London Heathrow to Haneda
Between February 19 and March 26, the service will operate on Monday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The flight will depart from London Heathrow at 0800 local and arrive at Haneda 0500 local the following day.

Haneda to London Heathrow
Between February 19 and March 26, the service will operate on a Monday, Tuesday, Friday, Saturday and Sunday. The flight will depart from Haneda at 0625 local and arrive at London Heathrow at 1000 local.

From March 27, 2010 the flights will arrive and depart from Heathrow approximately one hour later.

London Heathrow to Tokyo Narita will continue as normal for now.

The HND prize is significant as the airport is opened up to more foreign traffic. It will be interesting to see how other carriers operate. Already the America’s have awarded their routes. It’ll be interesting to see how the rest of the European industry reacts….

It seems the UK regionals are starting consolidation moves. Air Southwest (which I’ve talked about in this blog when it’s parent company put it up for sale)

It seems that there is a knight in shining armour, and that knight is another UK Regional – Eastern Airways

Sutton Harbour (Air Southwest’s parent) put the airline on the market due to the little economic problems that have plagued the UK recently.

Services will be retained, and the band retained for services in the South West of the United Kingdom (which serve Bristol, Plymouth and Newquay).

The takeover is expected to be completed next month with terms not disclosed. Of course there will be room to modify and combine fleets – or reduce fleets as needed as both airlines operate radically different fleets – Air Southwest operating Dash8 Q300′s, with Eastern running Jetstream 41s, Saab 2000s and Embraer ERJ-135s.

What sorts of cuts however, is another matter completely….