Bristol: Jet2 Route News & Base Updates

[Aviador]

So is the positioning Jet2 from Bristol to Leeds Sunday morning the aircraft that operates the Bristol Sharm El Sheikh

 

[TheLocalYokel]

No, its the one that worked the Chambery (a B 733).

The BRS Mayfly shows it positioning in from LBA at 0700 this morning, working to CMF and back, before departing BRS 1325 to position back to LBA.

When I've looked at the Mayfly through the winter the CMF has invariably been worked by a 733 that positioned in from Blackpool, and back there afterwards, but at least on one occasion it went empty to Bournemouth after its ski trip. So far as I am aware, it's unusual for this one to position in/out from/to LBA. Probably to do with the fact that we are ending the winter season and gradually moving into the summer one, with a consequent differing need for the positioning of airframes.

The Sharm operates on a Monday and is a B 757. It usually positions in from EMA early Monday, does the SSH, then parks up at BRS for several days before going back to EMA where I believe it also has a weekly SSH commitment from that airport.

Occasionally though it has positioned in from LBA.

 

[Marko1]

New base starting may 2021 - routes on the website !!!!

 

[Ray Finkle]

Bristol now showing in the app.

Salzburg
Grenoble
Corfu
Heraklion
Kalamata
Kefalonia
Kos
Mytilene
Preveza
Rhodes
Santorini
Skiathos
Thessaloniki
Zante
Naples
Verona
Faro
Funchal
Almeria
Fuerteventura
Girona
Las Palmas
Ibiza
Lanzarote
Palma
Menorca
Reus
Tenerife
Geneva
Antalya
Dalaman
Izmir

Will look at dates and frequencies in a bit unless someone beats me to it.

Great news for BRS 👍

 

[Sherburnflyer92]

Well there's a curve ball for a Tuesday evening. I suspect it looks similar to the TC programme ish, Similar to what they offered in terms of frequency. I reckon this was coming however COVID ruined the bigger base launch. None the less good news. @TheLocalYokel enjoy the sight of the Norths airline and of course, reet proper service. 🤣

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Well there's a curve ball for a Tuesday evening. I suspect it looks similar to the TC programme ish, Similar to what they offered in terms of frequency. I reckon this was coming however COVID ruined the bigger base launch. None the less good news. @TheLocalYokel enjoy the sight of the Norths airline and of course, reet proper service. 🤣

There have been some strong rumours in the past week or so of an imminent BRS Jet2 base announcement, but it wasn't possible to post them. I think that today's earlier discussion on the LBA Jet2 thread contained some big hints. Excellent news to see the rumours were true.

Mytilene and Kalamata are new to BRS as far as I can remember, and it's great to see Salzburg back as a summer route. For years it's been ski-season only at BRS.

It now remains to see how easyJet, Ryanair and TUI react.

Addendum

It looks as though Salzburg might in fact be a skis season route too.

 

[IanFarquharson]

56 departures per week in August, so 4 based units

 

[Sherburnflyer92]

Depending how we are going with COVID and the governments reactions ... I would say watch the space of 4 units. Could easily be increased to 6 if sells well - Canaries and Turkey are all on the side of caution regarding frequency. These are volume routes so depending how holidays/airline seats shift of the shelf so to speak maybe more is coming. Jet2 have always played that game and it is why they are and continue to be so successful.

@TheLocalYokel very interesting. I didn't read much into it. As for SZG - it's winter only I'm afraid to break that news. I was very surprised to see it Summer it would be the only base that would have a SZG flight in Summer. And I would of thought BHX/MAN would be ahead of BRS for that flight. Hopefully some decent recovery coming and well you never know where this could end up. Great exciting times ahead.

 

[mathers_wales_uk]

Have they the space for 6 units overnight?

 

[Sherburnflyer92]

Have they the space for 6 units overnight?

Loss of BMI Regional and TC I think I make that 6. Maybe I'm wrong. @TheLocalYokel will know more. Plus are they expanding apron space? And also Jet2 are not afraid to tow aircraft around overnight if the airport are good with it. IE - park it somewhere else after it arrives back and tow it off. Tow it back for a morning departure.

 

[Jerry]

Wow! Didn't see that coming especially during the current climate!

 

[superking]

TC airline had 3 based aircraft. BMI Regional if im not mistaken had 5 aircraft based in BRS.Did little planet have a aircraft based as well.If i remember correct TUI had the 787 on the ground some nights as well. This was all before the old terminal was knocked down to make more stands.

 

[andrewgreen]

Great news and big post Covid boost for the airport. Could it be possible we might see the return of the B.757 or will the base be all B.737 ?

 

[Severn]

Fantastic news for BRS finally welcoming Jet2 and being the 10th UK base, especially in these uncertain times!

The base will see 4x B737-800s based, all operating 2x return flights a day (however one aircraft only operates 1x return flight on a Wednesday and then squeezes in 3x return flights on a Saturday).

Looking at mid-August 2021, there will be 56x weekly departures to 29x destinations.
This is already more weekly flights than Jet2s BFS and EDI bases and only just behind GLA (although all these bases are temporarily larger during June and July for the earlier school holidays).

Below are the weekly departures for a week in mid-August from BRS:

Spain - 24x weekly
Mainland
REU - 2x weekly
GRO - 1x weekly
LEI - 1x weekly
-------
Balearics
PMI - 5x weekly
IBZ - 3x weekly
MAH - 3x weekly
-------
Canaries
TFS - 3x weekly
ACE - 2x weekly
FUE - 2x weekly
LPA - 2x weekly

Greece - 17x weekly
CFU - 2x weekly
HER - 2x weekly
JSI - 2x weekly
RHO - 2x weekly
ZTH - 2x weekly
EFL - 1x weekly
JTR - 1x weekly
KGS - 1x weekly
KLX - 1x weekly
MJT - 1x weekly
PVK - 1x weekly
SKG - 1x weekly

Turkey - 8x weekly
DLM - 4x weekly
AYT - 3x weekly
ADB - 1x weekly

Portugal - 5x weekly
FAO - 4x weekly
FNC - 1x weekly

Italy - 2x weekly
NAP - 1x weekly
VRN - 1x weekly


ALC, AGP, PFO, LCA, DBV and BOJ are the most popular destinations served from other bases but are not on sale (yet) from BRS. Maybe we will see these as destinations in the future.

Congratulations again to both Jet2 and BRS teams who have managed to pull this out of the bag!

 

[Marko1]

It will be interesting how the other 3 will react if at all. It’s interesting to note that jet2 has no services yet to Croatia , Cyprus and most of the key Spanish mainland destinations. Maybe that’s a deliberate plan to avoid too much competition. Ryanair is lightly touched by jet2 and tui has chosen not to pursue Almeria and Izmir which would have been launched this summer plus I guess easyJet’s network is so diverse that I’m sure they will all cope

 

[Jerry]

Jet2 will effect them to what extent is unknown. Jet2 are an aggressive airline I expect that more based aircraft will be added before April and hope they squeeze all the airlines at Bristol so much that they add flights at Cardiff and Exeter instead! Fingers crossed!

 

[ROC10]

The release on the BRS website states 3x based aircraft for S21.

Jet2.com and Jet2holidays flies into its tenth UK base – Bristol Airport

Jet2.com and Jet2holidays flies into its tenth UK base – Bristol Airport

www.bristolairport.co.uk

 

[Silvercity]

Great news for BRS, I wonder if they know something about an improvement to the quarantine 14 day situation.

 

[TheLocalYokel]

Wow! Didn't see that coming especially during the current climate!

It shows what might be happening behind the scenes at any airport without rumours being discussed openly on public platforms. In fact, two sources told me within one day the week before last that Jet2's 10th UK base would be announced within the next week or two and that it would be a 3 or 3/4 aircraft base (the sources varied) at BRS. From cryptic comments made by at least one other F4A poster on this and other forums I suspected that person was aware as well. I was asked to say nothing and the most I could do was make a 'it's always darkest before the dawn' comment in a BRS forum post a week or so ago.

I had actually prepared a post last week musing on the various scenarios if an airline base such as Jet2 or Wizz turned up at BRS next summer but realised that the post could easily be read as an expectation of such an event so I didn't submit it, although with hindsight it might have made for an interesting discussion and by using Wizz as well as Jet2 I could have disguised the real reason for the post.

In fact, I was very surprised that people didn't begin to hint openly that Jet2 was on its way to BRS, as I assumed that it was known by a number of people outside the airline and airport.

Jet2 will effect them to what extent is unknown. Jet2 are an aggressive airline I expect that more based aircraft will be added before April and hope they squeeze all the airlines at Bristol so much that they add flights at Cardiff and Exeter instead! Fingers crossed!

Ironically, had the pandemic not intervened BRS might not have been able to accommodate a Jet2 base at all. In February this year the airport's rolling 12-month passenger total was nearly 9.2 million, well on the way to the projected 10 mppa at the end of next year which is the airport's current passenger cap.

Now the entire aviation scene has altered and no-one had accurately predict what will happen in 2021 let alone after that.

On the one hand having three major low cost airlines (four with the Wizz operation to Katowice) in substantial numbers plus a significant TUI base might be too much for the available passenger numbers in 2021 if flying is severely curtailed by government action or even by sentiment. Alternatively, if flying is eased (definitely no pun intended) and there is a strong demand from punters then Jet2 would be in place to help with the numbers wanting to fly via BRS.

It has to be remembered that easyJet probably won't be able to increase its previous 18-aircraft base at BRS, or even maintain it at that number, because of its fleet reductions and Thomas Cook was never fully replaced. Others have commented on the Greek emphasis of Jet2's programme, an area in which Thomas Cook was strong.

There might be some displacement to CWL and/or EXT with Ryanair seemingly the most likely in my view, were it to happen. However, I doubt that Ryanair would want to give up too much on a base like BRS. TUI too might feel the need for a slight reorganisation in the south-west sector of Britain. The next few weeks or months ought to give us a clue to the reaction of these other airlines.

BRS has said for a long time that it prefers to grow using existing airline partners so a substantial new airline presence is an alteration to that policy, if indeed it was as strong as a policy. Comments have been made in the past here and elsewhere that to reach 12 mppa would ideally involve the presence of another significant airline player, not least because easyJet, welcome and invaluable as it undoubtedly is, is already responsible for over half of BRS's passenger numbers.

The next few years will see airports trying to regain their pre-pandemic positions, not least with passenger numbers, and then kick on from that. There are at least four top 20 UK airports, CWL being one, that have yet to regain their pre-'noughties' recession passenger numbers, and EXT only did so last year. In the post-pandemic scramble to return to previous sunlit uplands (to plagiarise one of Britain's greatest men) airports will need all the ammunition they can find.

BRS has one obvious and potentially insurmountable problem. If it loses its planning application appeal it will be stuck with a 10 mppa passenger cap for many years to come, perhaps for ever. In the meantime it now has a breathing space and can use other airlines to help existing ones rebuild its castle. The real crunch would come when it's back to the 9 mppa level and is then facing a brick wall just ahead because it has lost its appeal.

What the deal with Jet2 is we don't know. The BRS owners are already prepared to speculate to the future with the multi-million pound public transport interchange being brought forward and money being spent on attempts to compulsorily purchase land and properties in order to dual the A38 in the vicinity of the airport. They have doubtless been advised by their senior airport management that Jet2 would be an overall positive move, even in these uncertain times. All this has to be viewed in the context of a previously very profitable airport, so it can be safely assumed that the owners and senior management believe their actions, including the arrival of Jet2, will ensure the required level of profitability in the future.

One final comment on the airport appeal. The main argument will undoubtedly centre on environmental issues. Already opponents are saying that because the pandemic has decimated passenger numbers an expansion is not necessary. If the airport can show that it has the wherewithal to grow itself back to pre-pandemic levels and substantially beyond that the presence of Jet2 would add weight to that contention. There are calls to move the extra BRS flights that expansion would allow to other airports, CWL being particularly keen to benefit. Environmentally, extra flights would emit the same amount of gases into the atmosphere whether the aircraft flew from BRS, CWL, EXT or any other airport in the country.

Finally, finally. Just come across this interview with Jet2 CEO Steve Heapy in which he touches at some length on the BRS base. It was not something they did at the last minute. It's been under consideration for a while and they are aware of the competition they face at the airport.

https://www.travelweekly.co.uk/articles/392310/jet2-announces-bristol-as-tenth-airport-base

 

[Seasider]

Well there's a curve ball for a Tuesday evening. I suspect it looks similar to the TC programme ish, Similar to what they offered in terms of frequency. I reckon this was coming however COVID ruined the bigger base launch. None the less good news. @TheLocalYokel enjoy the sight of the Norths airline and of course, reet proper service. 🤣

wi' mushy peas as well.