What the hell was going on at CRL yesterday? Ryanair? Joke.

Post by **speedbird1** » 30 Jun 2006, 10:48

More anti Ryanair! If we all hate them so much why do so many people fly with them...

Emirates

teddybAIR · Post by **teddybAIR** » 30 Jun 2006, 11:03

Because generally people are more assertive on forums then they are in real life!

Flying-Belgian · Post by **Flying-Belgian** » 30 Jun 2006, 11:04

My best advice:

Stop flying with Ryanair !!!

It's a crap airline. All they do well is lying - lying - lying - lying and again lying.

As I always say you get what you paid for at the price level you paid...

FB.

Post by **sn26567** » 30 Jun 2006, 11:18

Emirates wrote:If we all hate them so much why do so many people fly with them...

...because they don't know yet!

Post by **speedbird1** » 30 Jun 2006, 12:51

Flying-Belgian wrote:My best advise:

Stop flying with Ryanair !!!

It's a crap airline. All they do well is lying - lying - lying - lying and again lying.

As I always say you get what you paid for at the price level you paid...

FB.

Have you flown with Ryanair?

Emirates

chunk · Post by **chunk** » 30 Jun 2006, 12:56

sn26567 wrote:
chunk wrote:I am not sure I can claim as they are claiming its weather related and how can you dispute that even when the weather was OK. The explanation about CAT I makes sense but doesnt explain how a flight to Venice can first land and then take off in the time we were waiting to board!
You can dispute their opinion with a proper meteorological report, and he fact that other Ryanair flights took off and landed at the same moment!
I would not let it go: I successfully sued Virgin Express in the past for stolen checked baggage and got more than the ridiculous compensation of the Warsaw Convention. Here you have clear EU rules to protect you.

By the way, what did they offer or suggest after your flight was cancelled? "Go to Beauvais by your own means to catch another Ryanair flight"?

What they offered was:

1) Wait until Thursday! Only one flight a day....sorry but I dont have two days to spend in Charleroi waiting for these idiots to do what I paid them to do.

2) Fly to DUblin at 5.30pm eventhough there was no guarantee that would go either and connect to a flight to Edinburgh. You try getting from Edinburgh to PIK (where my car was parked) at midnight - good luck. Besides it clearly says on the contract of carriage that connections on Ryanair should not be attempted. Presumably there is a sub clause somewhere thats says 'unless we f*ck up'!!

that was it. We only knew about the Beauvais option as someone mentioned it in the queue - they werent even going to offer it!!! Eventually they gave us tickets from Beauvais to PIK but siad we have to get to Beauvais underour own steam. I am hoping my trael insurance will cover my costs though.....but insurance companies are robbing B*star*s as well generally.

I will check out the websites posted by everyone - how do you get a meteo report for Charleroi from Tuesday then?

And to the guy who says we should stop complaining about RYanair.....I never had a problem with them, which is why I continued to use them. Now that I have gone through this - they will be for emergency use only.....

Flying-Belgian · Post by **Flying-Belgian** » 30 Jun 2006, 15:30

Emirates wrote:
Flying-Belgian wrote:My best advise:

Stop flying with Ryanair !!!

It's a crap airline. All they do well is lying - lying - lying - lying and again lying.

As I always say you get what you paid for at the price level you paid...

FB.
Have you flown with Ryanair?

Emirates

Yes I did, a few years ago to DUB with their 732 (Thanks God I've never boarded such rubbish bin plane since then).

I can understand that everyone hasn't the money to fly on an IATA carrier the year round, but FR is far far below VEX, Easy, Southwest, JetStar or VirginBlue to name a few.
When something gets wrong with FR you are left on your own with NOTHING. I hate the way they tell people "because of bad weather". We all know why they blame this factor...

FB.

teddybAIR · Post by **teddybAIR** » 30 Jun 2006, 15:49

The one and only reason why they blame the weather is because it is the cheapest solution for them. Rest assured that they calculated the effect on this on the decrease in number of flights the average passenger takes with ryanair, the cost of lawyers,... (their cost) and the avoided cost of delaying the next flight, booking some passangers on other flights, giving accomodation to the ones that don't have a flight to their end-destination,...(their return on doing this). And guess what: they figured out that it is cheaper to dump their passengers then to accomodate them. AND, as this fits perfectly in their businessmodel, they simply implement it.
Now the question remains: how can we change this? Well, it is clear that you have to make the above equation less favourable for Ryanair. Offcourse you will not be able to do so individually, but if everybody who feels put in disadvantage would take action, the amount of effort they will have to put in this will rise, and maybe they'll reconsider it.

Conclusion: if you do not react 'en masse', nothing will change!

Just of the record: I never flew Ryanair and I can assure you that I never will...

regards,
bAIR

Post by **sn26567** » 30 Jun 2006, 17:12

chunk wrote:how do you get a meteo report for Charleroi from Tuesday then?

First try: Charleroi, Belgium; 27/06/2006 à 21h20; Cond: Nuageux (=cloudy); Temp: 16 °C; Bar: 1021.0 hpa

Second try for 27 June (http://www.infoclimat.fr/obs-horaires/? ... 2006-06-27):

HEURE NEB. TEMPS TEMP. HUMIDEX IRE PRECIP. PRESSION VAR. SUR 3H HUMIDITE VISI VENT
HR P. ROSEE DIR. MOYEN RAFALES
21h UTC
23h CEST 7/8 15.2°C 17.8 15.2 1021.3 hPa +0.5 hPa 85% 12.7°C 7 km NNE /20° 5 km/h 9 km/h
18h UTC
20h CEST 7/8 17.4°C 20.7 17.4 0.9mm/12h 1020.6 hPa -0.1 hPa 81% 14.1°C NNE /20° 7 km/h 13 km/h
15h UTC
17h CEST 7/8 16.8°C 20 16.8 1020.7 hPa +0.1 hPa 82% 13.8°C 9 km NNE /20° 3 km/h 9 km/h
12h UTC
14h CEST 7/8 14.9°C 17.9 14.9 0.9mm/6h 1020.8 hPa +0.3 hPa 91% 13.5°C 5 km NNE /30° 3 km/h 11 km/h
09h UTC
11h CEST 8/8 13.7°C 16.3 13.7 1020.6 hPa +0.9 hPa 94% 12.8°C NNE /20° 5 km/h 11 km/h
06h UTC
08h CEST 8/8 12.9°C 15.5 12.9 0.1mm/12h 1019.7 hPa +0.2 hPa 99% 12.7°C NNE /40° 3 km/h 7 km/h
03h UTC
05h CEST 8/8 13.1°C 15.6 13.1 1019.5 hPa -0 hPa 97% 12.6°C NE /50° 3 km/h 7 km/h
00h UTC
02h CEST 8/8 13.6°C 16.1 13.6 0mm/6h 1019.4 hPa -0.1 hPa 93% 12.5°C ENE /70° 1 km/h 9 km/h

luckyme · Post by **luckyme** » 30 Jun 2006, 22:34

As a Ryanair employee, I can tell you that Ryanair don't just cancel flights for fun! It costs a lot of money and messes up the schedules with aircraft and crews in the wrong places.

Here is the weather for Charleroi on Tuesday morning 27/06/2006;

EBCI 270720Z 05005KT 020V080 1800 BR FEW002 BKN004 13/13 Q1020 NOSIG=
EBCI 270750Z 02005KT 330V070 2000 BR FEW004 BKN006 14/13 Q1020 TEMPO 1500 BR BKN003=
EBCI 270820Z 02007KT 330V070 2200 BR BKN006 14/13 Q1020 TEMPO 1500 BR BKN003=
EBCI 270850Z 02005KT 320V070 2500 BR BKN006 14/13 Q1020 TEMPO 1500 BR BKN003=

Basically between 0950-1050 local time, light winds from the north (5 knots), poor visibility but not a significant problem (1500-2500 metres), mist, with low cloud from 200 feet to 600 feet, temperature 13-14C.

The low cloud was the problem not the visibility. CAT1 for CRL means the crew have to be fully visual with groud at 200 feet above the runway. It is illegal to continue below this level. The crews could not fully see the runway within the required limits.

CAT2 or CAT3 would have been useful in this weather with visual at 100 feet for CAT2 requirements.

As said before, the aircraft(3) were diverted to Liege and later repositioned back to CRL before crew hours ran out and weather improved. It's very expensive many many €000's for Ryanair to divert any flights because of the extra costs including fuel, aircraft hours (maintenance), landing fees, handling fees, ATC fees, refunds and so on.

It's unfortunate but that's the way it goes sometimes. Cancellations are rare but sometimes unavoidable. The usual suspects come out to tell everyone how bad Ryanair is yet they always have their own motives.

Regards to all.

DFW · Post by **DFW** » 30 Jun 2006, 23:54

sn26567 wrote:
DFW wrote:the dominant LCC here in the States, Southwest Airlines, is a very well run airline. I don't fly it often because I don't like flying in steerage. But I know that when I do fly it, it's almost guaranteed that I will leave on time and arrive on time. Absolutely no doubts.
Cqn you tell us aboput the policy of Southwest when tey have to cancel a flight:
a) for bad weather conditions?
b) for mechanuical reasons?
Reimbursement? Next available flight on Southwest (even if that means in 2 weeks - policy of Ryanair)? Flights of other airlines to same destination? Meals, hotel rooms and telephone calls?

My experience is that they will tell you what the problem is and what they are doing to fix the problem.

However, now that I think about it, Southwest has a different business model than Ryan Air. They only fly into medium or large airports, where they can offer multiple flights per day.

chunk · Post by **chunk** » 03 Jul 2006, 10:20

luckyme wrote:As a Ryanair employee, I can tell you that Ryanair don't just cancel flights for fun! It costs a lot of money and messes up the schedules with aircraft and crews in the wrong places.

Here is the weather for Charleroi on Tuesday morning 27/06/2006;

EBCI 270720Z 05005KT 020V080 1800 BR FEW002 BKN004 13/13 Q1020 NOSIG=
EBCI 270750Z 02005KT 330V070 2000 BR FEW004 BKN006 14/13 Q1020 TEMPO 1500 BR BKN003=
EBCI 270820Z 02007KT 330V070 2200 BR BKN006 14/13 Q1020 TEMPO 1500 BR BKN003=
EBCI 270850Z 02005KT 320V070 2500 BR BKN006 14/13 Q1020 TEMPO 1500 BR BKN003=

Basically between 0950-1050 local time, light winds from the north (5 knots), poor visibility but not a significant problem (1500-2500 metres), mist, with low cloud from 200 feet to 600 feet, temperature 13-14C.

The low cloud was the problem not the visibility. CAT1 for CRL means the crew have to be fully visual with groud at 200 feet above the runway. It is illegal to continue below this level. The crews could not fully see the runway within the required limits.

CAT2 or CAT3 would have been useful in this weather with visual at 100 feet for CAT2 requirements.

As said before, the aircraft(3) were diverted to Liege and later repositioned back to CRL before crew hours ran out and weather improved. It's very expensive many many €000's for Ryanair to divert any flights because of the extra costs including fuel, aircraft hours (maintenance), landing fees, handling fees, ATC fees, refunds and so on.

It's unfortunate but that's the way it goes sometimes. Cancellations are rare but sometimes unavoidable. The usual suspects come out to tell everyone how bad Ryanair is yet they always have their own motives.

Regards to all.

Thanks for the explanation. Only one thing though.....how come a flight landed and took off for Venice in the time we were waiting then?
See how we find it hard to believe?! And yes it was Ryanair!

pressman · Post by **pressman** » 03 Jul 2006, 11:01

At the moment in CRL the ILS is out of service , so it is a localiser only approach so there are higher minimums 1100 ft QNH i seem to remember - 500 ft AGL approx , As the RVRs reported were ok to land the planes are legal to start the approach even though cloud may be blocking them , the venice flight would have made the approach to the outer marker and probably got a small break in the clouds and managed to pick up the runway lights and so continue the approach to land - no problems . The venice flight took off because the mins for take off are much much lower , so take off was not a problem .
I would imagine the other planes made the same approaches and could not become visual by the marker , probably returned to the hold for one or two rounds and tried again , at this stage these planes would probably have been reaching the minimum fuel required to divert to liege and land cat III with the legal fuel requirement , I am quite confident that this is the reason that one plane landed and the others had to divert . When FR are briefing for the approach the fuel is discussed - ie when we arrive at crl we will have 3.5 T , we need 2.5t to divert to LGE , so that gives us 1T of holding fuel approx 25mins for holding and the app before we MUST divert to a cat III destination .

SN30952 · Post by **SN30952** » 03 Jul 2006, 12:01

sn26567 wrote:Can you tell us about the policy of Southwest when tey have to cancel a flight:
a) for bad weather conditions?
b) for mechanical reasons?
Reimbursement? Next available flight on Southwest (even if that means in 2 weeks - policy of Ryanair)? Flights of other airlines to same destination? Meals, hotel rooms and telephone calls?

View the Southwest Airlines Customer Service Commitment Online in PDF* format.
Goto:
Irregular Operations 2
Delays and Cancellations 2
Departure Delays 3
Delays on the Aircraft 3
Overnight Accommodations and Other Expenses 4
Advisory at the Airport 4

Vinnie-Winnie · Post by **Vinnie-Winnie** » 03 Jul 2006, 13:39

southwest wrote:Because Southwest offers high-frequency service in most of the markets we serve, we can usually accommodate our inconvenienced Customers within a reasonable amount of time.

That's probably the main difference between Ryanair and Southwest! Ryanair does not offer high frequencies in general! Reminds me of this Carcasonne- Charleroi flight which was cancelled a few months ago! Because Ryanair only flew there once a week the passengers were f*****!

Eurapart · Post by **Eurapart** » 03 Jul 2006, 21:31

With a fleet that is planned to multiply by 2.5 times by 2012, they will most likely increase frequencies on most routes.

As for members on here advising against flying with Ryanair. I have flown with them a number of times and know that I take a risk of getting stranded somewhere. Carefully read their terms and conditions, check out their prices and make up your own minds. Not everyone on here can afford SN's prices. I am capable of sleeping rough to await a replacement flight.

In the case of this post it appears to me that the flights were cancelled due to safety reasons.

airazurxtror · Post by **airazurxtror** » 03 Jul 2006, 22:01

Eurapart wrote:
As for members on here advising against flying with Ryanair. I have flown with them a number of times and know that I take a risk of getting stranded somewhere. Carefully read their terms and conditions, check out their prices and make up your own minds. Not everyone on here can afford SN's prices. I am capable of sleeping rough to await a replacement flight.

In the case of this post it appears to me that the flights were cancelled due to safety reasons.

My opinion exactly.
I have now logged 75 flights with Ryanair.
The only disturbance I have experienced, as of now, has been a flight departing from Liège instead of Charleroi, because of fog (nearly three hours late).
I am happy to pay a very small price for the FR ticket, being aware that I'll have to manage by myself if a flight is cancelled - such is the deal with MOL !
Furthermore, high-cost carriers have also been known to cancel flights. Even if they somehow take care of you, you have still lost a lot of time...

earthman · Post by **earthman** » 04 Jul 2006, 00:05

Just imagine the headlines if the flight had landed without seeing the runway at the marker. No good way out for Ryanair's PR in this case, I guess.

JetB · Post by **JetB** » 04 Jul 2006, 00:30

distance in time between Chaleroi and Liege, maybe 30 min driving time ?.

Ryanair doesn't even offer people to get on in Liege !.

You guy's at RYR seem to have a script "What to do when CRL is closed" but that often only includes bringing pax via bus from Liege to Chaleroi but never the other way around !.

This airline prefers to fly empty, who gives a f**** about those cheap one euro ticket pax anyway. Have a promotion one month later and RYR seems to fiend 1.000.000 fools that want to fly for free.

Nothing in this world is for free

.

earthman · Post by **earthman** » 04 Jul 2006, 03:19

The obvious problem with sending the passengers to Lille is that someone also has to grab all their luggage and send it in the same direction. I assume that the Lille-CRL bus takes the passengers after they already grabbed their gear from the carousel (if Lille actually has one).

In addition, having to wait for all those people and their luggage could mean that the plane's schedule gets completely messed up. If they just dump their cargo, eh, I mean passengers, fuel up, and fly off to wherever the poor souls at CRL wanted to be, they at least stand a chance of getting to that destination within reasonable time. Or they cancel that flight too, and send the plane to the destination where it was supposed to go after that.

Is it just me, or is the 'bad weather' excuse getting abused more than originally intended? It seems that the regulations were supposed to prevent this kind of cancelling of subsequent flights for the sake of keeping a schedule, but if the original delay was due to weather, all subsequent cancellations are claimed to be due to weather. Someone should sue them all the way to the European Court, to create a proper precedent and explanation of the regulations.