Air Belgium: a rebirth?

[Didymus]

Not sure I'm a fan of the logo. A bit to cluttered imo. They should simplify it a bit.

Reminds me of this:

[AIRMARSHAL]

Companies like China Southern downgrade their equipment on AMS from A380 to A332 due to very Low Chinese demand because of what happened in Europe lately . Isn't this kind of a red flag already ...

[ezis_bis]

hell, why not let Air Belgium operate and just codeshare in the beginning?
(I'm just thinking out loud)

I was thinking as well code-share would be an idea, but we have no idea yet how this company and service will look like. (Or if it will ever take off?)

Maybe we just have to wait and see what happens

[quixoticguide]

BRU-HKG would be great

[SLM]

Fingers crossed for BRU/LGG to PVG!

[sn-remember]

I prefered he original livery although slightly retro ... And "Air Belgium" titles should be written with no blank, lke "AirFrance" (imo) ...

[Inquirer]

Nice to hear about a new Belgian aviation initiative!
It's a pity we don't know more details about it, as the devil is in the detail.
I understand they want to keep it a bit covered till they are fully ready, but if they really intend to start in say like 6 months or so, shouldn't they be ready to go live by now, and thus provide us with more detailed information on their destinations, frequencies, fares and linked to all of that: type of plane?
Surely they don't expect bookings to stream in in sufficiently large volumes to fill their plane profitable within a couple of weeks of first flight?
Or are these of no real importance? If so, it can only mean it's predominantly a package holiday airlines which may have secured (or at least intend to bid on) a block contract with some Chinese (?) organization.
Could indeed be an airlines aimed at those Chinese tourists flown in to LGG every week, like some here already suggested.

[OO-SUA]

Why not an SN/AB collaboration like "Birdy"?

[quixoticguide]

Why not an SN/AB collaboration like "Birdy"?

LH wouldn't allowed this I guess

[teach]

This thing has 'VG Airlines' written all over it...

[sn26567]

Why not an SN/AB collaboration like "Birdy"?

Hello OO-SUA. Welcome to Luchtzak!

Not only wouldn't LH allow such a collaboration, but SN wouldn't take such a risk: see how cautiously they are entering the India market!

[Flanker2]

Flanker2 posts an idea on luchtzak.be.
Fast-forward 5 years, copy-paste and someone is launching it.

Posted 19 Feb 2011, 13:39:

In Liege, there is one kind of operation that could work, it's a long haul charter and freight concept with regional feeding:

example
-For long-haul, lease 6 B777-300 (ER or non-ER if cheaper), operate charters to destinations in South America, Asia, Africa and maybe even Alaska/Canada in high density 1-class/9-abreast/500 pax configuration.
The flights should be 2 or 3 weekly so that 6 B773's should be able to operate to 18 key destinations.
The cargo hold should, besides the pax luggage, be stuffed with freight in partnership with TNT. Cargo volume of the B777-300 is huge, which explains my choice of aircraft.
-For short-haul, lease 20 ATR-72's with QC option, operate regional routes with feed pax and express package feeders to/from UK, Germany, Denmark, France, Switzerland, Benelux, Northern Italy to connect on to/from the long-haul flights.
Sell low fares point to point to fill the airplane and advertise the long-haul charter routes.
At night QC them into full package freighters and operate regional package routes for TNT. That should save them plenty of money over their current BAe146 operation.

The low airport taxes policy of Bierset and some Walloon regional incentives could make it a real low fares long-haul airline and the cheap to lease/operate ATR 72 and its ability to Quick Change from pax into a freight aircraft would make it possible to operate a sustainable regional operation even from an airport like Liege.

Good luck, it could work out.
Please don't be another Beontop.

[Bracebrace]

Who is launching this because I don't how this scenario connects with the new Air Belgium?

To be precise: the TNT freight transported by the TNT long haul fleet of 777 & 747 was "minor". The majority of the freight was/is Emirates (777's worked for Qatar for a while) freight and other customers. TNT also transports a lot of DG/CAO freight. With pax on the main deck you can forget it.

If this was written 5 years ago, you were late. TNT had a couple of 146 and 737 QC's in the period 10-5 years ago and stopped the socalled ideal "nightfreight/daypax".

[brusselsairlinesfan]

No more news regarding Air Belgium? (I like the name very much!)

[Inquirer]

No idea if this is directly linked to this Air Belgium concept, and if so is this is good or bad news for this project, but it seems the Chinese touroperator sending planes to Liege will no longer do so!

http://www.dhnet.be/actu/economie/liege ... 2d1170c9fd

[Acid-drop]

I just hope this is not a coincidence ...
they mention U-tour is looking for another partner ...
it's now or never

[Sabena320]

From what I heard a few days ago is that the contract with I-Fly was indeed going to end and Air Belgium would take over that contract. So this news seems to confirm that, hopefully...

[Inquirer]

The article mentions the end of this month as the end of their activities.
Unless Air Belgium is ready to take over by then, there will thus be a gap.
Can't say it sounds very reassuring: how sustainable is this business they want to rely on, if it can apparently be missed with not much problem?

[webstermc]

the gap could mean break for winter period? so restart in march/april for summer period?

[Acid-drop]

i think Ifly flew a 757 last year in winter, so no gap ...
but everything is possible...
Now ... do they have a aircraft ? Can it be hidden that well ? a new OO reg would be seen by someone, right ?