BA boss on London City & Gatwick

Tom Stoddart, Managing Director of both BA CityFlyer at London City Airport (LCY) and BA EuroFlyer at Gatwick (LGW), proved to be an articulate and interesting speaker for the Aviation Club’s September lunch.

Stoddart (44), still an Airbus A320 Captain, made two significant points.  Any new aircraft for LCY is at least two years away.  Whatever is chosen will give 25% extra capacity and be far more environmentally friendly than the existing planes.  He is very pleased with the current Embraer E195 SR, a new term for most, SR standing for “special requirements” pertaining to the particular union demands at British Airways, or what is called a ‘scope agreement’.

As for LGW, he set out the problems and the reason that EuroFlyer was created.

“BA has never really made money short-haul at Gatwick, with only one year in the last 15 delivering profits.  The solution was for BA to create a new entity that would operate independently, with its own AOC and its own management team, allowing British Airways, via Euroflyer, to compete with low-cost carriers. As of last week, the Euroflyer business had operated 28,000 flights and carried 3.7 million customers”.  It is clearly moving in the right direction”.

Please also see London City Airport update in this TNU.

www.ba.com

https://aviationclub.org.uk

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