BRU winter 2008-2009: latest news, routes, airlines

[DannyVDB]

See one of my previous posts ...

In one of the last issues of B-there they announce codeshare on this route (with ADRIA). They speak of up to 3 flights a day. I guess they now drop their own flight ... 3/day sounds too much anyway.

Regards,
Danny

[Atlantis]

They are going to codeshare indeed on this route. In my opinion, the route Brussels Airlines offered was not attractive.

Adria will offer three flights a day: morning, late afternoon and evening. They will cover well this route with a small aircraft.

[Air2D2]

Last Friday, Thomas Cook Belgium (Thomas Cook, Neckermann, Pegase) announced that they cancel their Wednesday-flights from Brussels to Punta Cana / Dominican Republic (operated by XL Airways France). This means that only the Friday-flight will be operated, half of their planned capacity.

Passengers who were booked on the Wednesday-flights for 1, 2 or 3 weeks will automatically be rebooked on their Friday-flights (!?).

Passengers who booked a Wednesday-flight with return flight on Friday, will be offered an alternative flight on Wednesday. I presume this might be with Jetairfly, as they operate a BRU-PUJ on Wednesday.

The cancellation of the Wednesday-flight is applicable to the winter 2008/09 and summer 2009-season.

[summersso]

They are going to codeshare indeed on this route. In my opinion, the route Brussels Airlines offered was not attractive.

Adria will offer three flights a day: morning, late afternoon and evening. They will cover well this route with a small aircraft.

I expect BRU-LJU was useful when Slovenia held the Presidency of the European Union from January to June, but since that's over there must be far less demand.

[outofafrica]

What happened with the rumour that SN was going to operate the flight on behalf of FQ?

[JOVAN]

They are going to codeshare indeed on this route. In my opinion, the route Brussels Airlines offered was not attractive.

Adria will offer three flights a day: morning, late afternoon and evening. They will cover well this route with a small aircraft.

I expect BRU-LJU was useful when Slovenia held the Presidency of the European Union from January to June, but since that's over there must be far less demand.

....which illustrates the " long term " vision of SN.

seeing the number of code-share they started, and finished sometimes very very soon, I see only confirmation of my standpoint that SN has no real management, no real business plan, ...and is no longer growing because of that.

[tolipanebas]

....which illustrates the " long term " vision of SN.

Actually it does as it is a long standing policy of SN to increase frequencies between BRU and the capital of the EU country holding the rotating presidency. FWIW: they've done it to THF, to CPH and thus also LJU, always adding an extra flight a few months before the presidency starts and dropping it soon after the presidency comes to an end. Now, for the moment France is holding the presidency, so this time no flights have been added (same as when it is The Netherlands or Luxembourg which is holding the presidency), but after that you can be pretty sure that flights to PRG will be increased temporarily as the Chech Republic assumes the presidency for the first time.

[outofafrica]

....which illustrates the " long term " vision of SN.

seeing the number of code-share they started, and finished sometimes very very soon, I see only confirmation of my standpoint that SN has no real management, no real business plan, ...and is no longer growing because of that.

Exactly,just another example, can somebody explain me why SN is code sharing with BD to all of BD's destinations except for LHR (BD's main UK base) which will be continued with BA????!!!!! This does not make any sence at all....

[tolipanebas]

Can somebody explain me why SN is code sharing with BD to all of BD's destinations except for LHR (BD's main UK base) which will be continued with BA????!!!!! This does not make any sence at all....

Some people here really need to think logically for a minute before fulminating right away!

After the sale of 'BA Connect' to 'flyBE' last year, LHR and LGW have actually been the ONLY 2 UK destinations of Brussels Airlines which still see a code share with BA: all of their other UK destinations have seen the long lasting BA code-share being replaced with a BE one. As such there is no such thing as a single code share argeement between SN and their UK partner, but rather 2 different agreements: one with BA and one with BE.
What SN has done last week is to end the agreement with BE with the start of the new winter time table and replace it by a logic code share agreement with future Star alliance partner and LH affiliate BMI.

Now, as you interestingly observe, the BA code share agreement indeed wasn't terminated and immediately you fulminate about the fact that this doesn't make any sense...

May I point out to you that it may not have been legally possible to terminate the code share agreement with BA by the end of october, contrary to the agreement with BE? Since the guaranteed access to LHR has always been of great importance to SN (and one of the reasons why 'Skyteam' was not a good alliance candidate in SN's eyes), it may not be far stretched to assume that upon agreeing to transfer their LHR slots to BA, BA and SN negoticated a very strict code share agreement, including some very strict and long non-standard termination clauses.

In this case, it makes perfect sense to see SN still bound to a code share contract with BA, whereas they already can replace their BE contract with a new one with BD.

Don't forget SN has already announced that it will take up to 2 years to fully allign their route structure with that of Star alliance, so it is no surprise to me that during the transition period you will still see them making use of what have now become 'weird and unlogic' code shares with some airlines. As time goes by, you'll gradually see more and more Star alliance airlines sneak in and replace non-Star alliance partners. Don't expect it to happen all at once and all at the same time though, for the reason that each code share agreement is a contract on itself and SN will most certainly honorate each contract in ful.

[Atlantis]

Lufthansa is going to increase the total number of flights between Brussels and Hamburg.

LH4627 will leave BRU every weekday (except during weekend) at 11.50h. A/C CRJ

[Atlantis]

Royal Air Maroc Cargo is going to upgrade again from a B737F to a B757F (DHL). They will also add Algeria as destination on Monday to Brussels.

[tolipanebas]

Some more network changes from SN have emerged for this winter season.

All in all, a LOT of flights have been cancelled, especially on saturdays, so I will not list those, since there are too many. A short overview of the other cut backs throughout the network:

ABJ will no longer be served on mondays and goes from 4 to 3 weekly flights.
AGP will be served only once daily iso twice daily.
ATH goes from twice daily to just once daily and will no longer be served on Tuesday and Saturday.
BCN sees its noon flight cancelled and will only be served 3 times a day iso 4 times.
CAG will be discontinued after NOV 18th.
DKR will not be served anymore on Thursday and goes from 6 to 5 weekly flights.
FAO will not be served anymore on Friday and Saturday.
FLR will be discontinued after NOV 16th.
LIS sees its noon flight cancelled and drops from 3 to just 2 daily flights.
MAD sees the earliest morning flight cancelled and thus drops from 5 to 4 daily flights.
MAN is cut back from 6 daily to 5 daily.
NAP will not be served on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
NCE is cut from 4 daily to 3 daily.
OPO will not be served Tuesdays and Thursday.
PMI is discontinued after NOV 01.

[VEX802]

Jet Airways has decided to reduce their operations on the new flight between Brussels and Bangalore. As from October 31, they will fly 4 times a week instead of daily.

From December 15 till January 14 they will fly daily on this route, afterwards again 4 times a week.

Source: http://www.luchtvaartnieuws.nl/news/?ID=28248

[OO-VEX]

Icelandair Cargo will stop BRU operations after tomorrow's last flight.
Icelandair press release

[sn26567]

All in all, a LOT of flights have been cancelled, especially on saturdays, so I will not list those, since there are too many. A short overview of the other cut backs throughout the network:...

What are the consequences on fleet and personnel? Because less flights means less staff and less aeroplanes.

Will some of the crew be fired? Some of the aircraft retired?

[Atlantis]

Jet Airways has decided to reduce their operations on the new flight between Brussels and Bangalore. As from October 31, they will fly 4 times a week instead of daily.

From December 15 till January 14 they will fly daily on this route, afterwards again 4 times a week.

Source: http://www.luchtvaartnieuws.nl/news/?ID=28248

The communication by Jet Airways is a real mess and its not clear any more for their partners. Too many CEO's of Jet are communicating. F.e. till today the first flight of BLR to BRU was still postponed. All worldwide expantions were in the freezer till the end of 2009. Now we see that they want to fly to BRU ex-BLR.

1800 people, mainly crew, was sacked last week. Within 24 hours all of them are back in service.

Who can believe them? I'm very glad for Brussels Airport with this extra new flight but they give too many people stress for nothing. Or you communicate correct info by one person or you don't.

That's a wise lesson for Jet.

Icelandair Cargo will stop BRU operations after tomorrow's last flight.
Icelandair press release

It was already is real surprise to see them during summer season after DHL moved the biggest part of their ops. There was only cargo ex-BRU to Iceland. Also DHL is hit by less demand in air cargo. That's one of the reasons why Icelandair Cargo moved away from Brussels Airport.

[JOVAN]

Some more network changes from SN have emerged for this winter season.

All in all, a LOT of flights have been cancelled, especially on saturdays, so I will not list those, since there are too many. A short overview of the other cut backs throughout the network:

ABJ will no longer be served on mondays and goes from 4 to 3 weekly flights.
AGP will be served only once daily iso twice daily.
ATH goes from twice daily to just once daily and will no longer be served on Tuesday and Saturday.
BCN sees its noon flight cancelled and will only be served 3 times a day iso 4 times.
CAG will be discontinued after NOV 18th.
DKR will not be served anymore on Thursday and goes from 6 to 5 weekly flights.
FAO will not be served anymore on Friday and Saturday.
FLR will be discontinued after NOV 16th.
LIS sees its noon flight cancelled and drops from 3 to just 2 daily flights.
MAD sees the earliest morning flight cancelled and thus drops from 5 to 4 daily flights.
MAN is cut back from 6 daily to 5 daily.
NAP will not be served on Monday, Wednesday and Friday.
NCE is cut from 4 daily to 3 daily.
OPO will not be served Tuesdays and Thursday.
PMI is discontinued after NOV 01.

Very serious reductions.

Soon we will have to fly to MAD and other capitals via FRA or MUC.
Congratulations SN !!!!!

[teach]

Congratulations SN !!!!!

For what? Responding to the current quickly developing and very quickly deepening economic crisis by adjusting capacity to real demand in order to prevent massive losses? For that, indeed congratulations SN.

We know that the second you see the mere mention of 'SN' you go into bitch mode, but what you're seeing here is something you're going to be seeing a whole lot more of the coming months, all over the continent: it's called adjusting to the economic reality. And it's got little if anything to do with SN.

[JOVAN]

Congratulations SN !!!!!

For what? Responding to the current quickly developing and very quickly deepening economic crisis by adjusting capacity to real demand in order to prevent massive losses? For that, indeed congratulations SN.

We know that the second you see the mere mention of 'SN' you go into bitch mode, but what you're seeing here is something you're going to be seeing a whole lot more of the coming months, all over the continent: it's called adjusting to the economic reality. And it's got little if anything to do with SN.

Let's just admit SN is a very weak player, and that the lack of strategy will hurt them more than other airlines.

Some people would call them 'losers'

[Established02]

Responding to the current quickly developing and very quickly deepening economic crisis by adjusting capacity to real demand in order to prevent massive losses?

Around 12h30-13h00 I passed through the airport and I had this awkward impression that there were way less passengers and people around today than at previous times when I passed through during lunch time. I felt like asking the staff working at the airport if they had the same impression.