PSD waives higher charge to Flybe for its ‘heavier’ jets
Monday 18th February 2013, 8:30AM GMT.
Flybe operates the Embraer E175 on its Gatwick route.
FLYBE will avoid £160,000 in airport fees after the Public Services political board decided not to charge more for its heavier jet aircraft, it has been confirmed.
The new E175 jets weigh six tonnes more than the old Q400 planes.
Airport director Colin Le Ray explained that airport charges were based on aircraft weight (a fixed charge) and the number of passengers each flight carried (a variable charge).
‘In this case PSD has recently considered and approved a discount on the fixed element, such that the heavier cost of operating the E175 is partly subsidised, and the airline will not pay any more than the equivalent charge of operating the lighter Q400,’ he said.
‘This is an arrangement previously applied some years ago, when the 146 jet replaced the F27 turboprop, then operated by Air UK.
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Surely the extra fees are because the heavier aircraft place more wear on the infrastructure, so charge them!
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Common sense prevails.
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What’s the betting that the fares will still go up?
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The States are even more stupid than what I originally thought! They part own their own airline which operates on the same route as flybe do and the States help them out by waivering extra charges that they should be paying. Aurigny are going to be ferrying empty planes to and from Gatwick now, losing even more cash.
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Common sense,whats that? The States,Who are they?
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Fantastic, well done!
Just one question …Now that PSD are waiving these costs can I also assume that Housing are going to waive the rules regarding right to work laws being infringed when Flybe bring their UK based pilots into a guernsey hotel to work on a permanent basis after they have sacked all their locally qualified Captains and First Officers for the sake of a six week jet course? Most of whom have been working for them between 10 and 20 years?
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Excellent question that needs answering.
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I think its a good decision,the E-175 jets are not much bigger than the Q400, 88 seats against the 78 seats and they will cost a lot more in fuel burn to operate the short route to Gatwick, especially if they cant fill those extra 10 seats.
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Once again the States showing their traditional total ineptitude at every level.
Impressive.
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So the states of Guernsey PSD department is waiving £160k of fees for Flybe (I didn’t know we had money to give away!?) and Flybe are saying ‘Thank you’ by making 18 local staff redundant and bringing in heavier aircraft that are no faster than the current planes but will cause far greater damage to the freshly laid £80 million pound runway……This Island is being run by …..
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I really have no interest in Flybe and will always fly with Aurigny as will most of my friends.
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To echo earlier comments, indeed common sense prevails and Guernsey is on track to receive a boost to its connections to mainland UK.
The truth of the matter though, Guernsey has one of the smallest, shortest runways use by commercial traffic in the British Isles. Due to this fact, Flybe will never be able to fill it with people AND fuel at the same time. There will always have to be trade of one or the other. That doesn’t happen with the turboprops, so to be fair – it’s fairly justified.
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An extra 10 seats per rotation is hardly a “boost”, especially when the 78 seats currently available cannot be filled.
The E175 in its standard configuration has a range of 1,800 miles. Given the distance to London the aircraft will never need to carry a full fuel payload, even when taking diversion and emergency fuel calculations into account.
You are right though, at MTOW of 37.5 tonnes the aircraft would need 2,244m of runway under standard meteorological conditions. Extend the runway out to the east, and we might get close. I understand there are some politicians already discussing such a plan. But how much more of our scarce land and non-existent cash should we allow PSD to squander?
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The runway at London City airport is 200m shorter than Guernsey, yet BA Cityflyer operate the 170 and 190 from it on routes that are much longer than Guernsey to Gatwick
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