Tag Archives: Tenerife Sur

Norwegian’s pilots continue to strike as talks fail

Norwegian Air Shuttle (Norwegian Air Norway) (Norwegian.com) (Oslo) continues to face a strike by its pilots after overnight mediated talks on a new collective agreement failed. The strike today enters the eighth day. The strike by its pilots, represented by the NPU and labor group Parat, will continue indefinitely. As a result Norwegian is canceling today all flights in Norway and Sweden and most flights between the Scandinavian capitals.

Norwegian issued a statement (translated from Norwegian):

“Norwegian has submitted several proposals that provide all the Scandinavian pilots job security, employment guarantee for three years, to keep their good wage conditions and not the least, their ties with the parent company. Therefore it is extremely sad that it was not possible to reach an agreement with Norwegian Pilot Union (NPU) and Parat with the national mediator. The strike continues, unfortunately indefinitely.

Norwegian deeply regrets that the strike will continue and that travelers, employees and others are affected. After many hours of negotiations on Friday night to Saturday, both sides failed to reach a solution. Norwegian wants an end to the strike and has gone a long way economically to end the strike and bring peace to the Group. The company has submitted written guarantees to the NPU on key points that job security, job security, and to become attached to the group.”

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Boeing 737-81D LN-NOR (msn 39412) completes the final approach into beautiful Tenerife Sur (Tenerife South Airport) in the Canary Islands.

Norwegian aircraft slide show:

Ryanair to make Berlin Schonefeld its 73rd base

Ryanair (Dublin) has announced it will open a new base at Berlin (Schonefeld), its 73rd base, from October with five based Boeing 737-800 aircraft. Ryanair will launch 16 new routes (22 in total) as part of its Berlin Winter 2015 schedule, which will grow Ryanair’s Berlin traffic to 2.6 million customers a year.

16 new routes include: Alicante, Athens, Barcelona, Bari, Bologna, Bratislava, Brussels, Glasgow, Madrid, Malaga, Palermo, Palma de Mallorca, Riga, Rome (Ciampino), Venice and Valencia.

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Boeing 737-8AS EI-EVH (msn 40290) prepares to land at Tenerife Sur.

Ryanair aircraft slide show:

Lufthansa to add two new routes from Munich to the Canary Islands

Lufthansa (Frankfurt) will add new weekly service from its Munich hub to both Lanzarote and Tenerife Sur for the winter 2015/2016 season. The two routes will be operated with Airbus A321s according to Airline Route.

Copyright Photo: SPA/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A319-131 D-AIRX (msn 887) in the 1955 retro jet scheme departs from London (Heathrow).

Lufthansa aircraft slide show:

Primera Air continues to expand from Scandinavia and Iceland

Primera Air (Scandinavia) (Copenhagen) is opening up new routes for the current winter season. On October 26, the company launched weekly service from Gothenburg and Malmo to Dubai (Al Maktoum), Helsinki to Fuerteventura and Las Palmas and from Malmo to Tenerife Sur.

Furthermore, late this month, the airline will start four new weekly routes; Aalborg-Las Palmas (December 19), Copenhagen-Billund-Lanzarote (December 19), Aarhus-Tenerife Sur (December 20) and Aalborg-Fuerteventura (December 22) per Airline Route.

In other related news, Primera Air (Iceland) (Keflavik) launched a new route to New York (JFK) on November 16 after acquiring rights to serve the United States.

Primera Air (Scandinavia) aircraft slide show:

http://airlinersgallery.smugmug.com/Airlines-Europe-2/Airlines-Europe-2/Primera-Air-Scandinavia

Ryanair announces its 72nd base in the Azores

Ryanair (Dublin) has announced a new base at Ponta Delgada Airport in the Azores. The Azores will be the Irish budget carrier’s 72nd base, and fourth in Portugal. Ryanair released the following statement:

“Ryanair, Europe’s favorite low fares airline, today announced it will open its fourth Portuguese base in the Azores from April 2015 with one based Boeing 737-800 and three new routes to London Stansted, Lisbon and Porto.”

The ultra low-cost carrier is also in discussions with the government of the Azores about possible services to Terceira and additional international flights to the islands.

In other news, ch-aviation is reporting Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary has revealed that the carrier is planning to lease seven aircraft to cover next year’s summer high season.

The airline currently operates 302 Boeing 737-800s on flights covering 180 destinations scattered throughout Europe and North Africa.

This year, the carrier wet leased four Boeing 737-400s, split between AirExplore (Bratislava) and Air Contractors (Dublin), three Boeing 737-800s from flydubai (Dubai), and a maiden Airbus A320-200 from defunct Italian carrier Livingston Compania Aerea (2nd) (Milan), for the duration of the summer

Reported by Oliver Wilcock, Assistant Editor, from Manchester.

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Boeing 737-8AS EI-EXE (msn 40321) gracefully climbs away from Tenerife Sur.

Ryanair aircraft slide show:

http://airlinersgallery.smugmug.com/Airlines-Europe-3/Airlines-Europe3-QZ/Ryanair

SmartWings is adding four new routes from Warsaw, Poland

SmartWings (smartwing.com) (Prague) is adding more routes and flights from Warsaw, Poland. Warsaw-Lanzarote was added yesterday (November 1) following by the Warsaw-Fuerteventura route tomorrow (November 3). Warsaw-Las Palmas will be added on November 4 and Warsaw-Tenerife Sur (South) on November 6 per Airline Route.

SmartWings is a brand name of Travel Service, a.s. (Travel Service Airlines) with regular flights from its base at Prague Airport.

During the year, SmartWings offers flights to more than forty popular destinations and resorts throughout and outside Europe with departures from Prague, Brno and Ostrava. Every summer season SmartWings brings flights to new destinations as well an increase of frequencies to the current ones.

Travel Service, a.s., the largest airline in the Czech Republic, has been operating in the market for 15 years. Travel Service, a.s. is the leader of the charter market in the Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary and it has a noticeable share in Poland. Apart from charter flights, Travel Service has also been conducting regular lines under the brand SmartWings since 2004 and since 2007 with private charter flights.

SmartWings operates Airbus A320s, Boeing 737-700s and 737-800s.

SmartWings Aircraft Slide Show:

Greybull Capital is the preferred bidder to acquire Monarch Holdings Limited

Monarch Group (Monarch Airlines) has announced Greybull Capital LLP is the preferred bidder to acquired the group. The company has also announced that the various labor groups have agreed to major concessions to make the acquisition possible. The group issued these two statements:

The Board of Monarch Holdings Limited has announced that Greybull Capital LLP is the preferred bidder to acquire Monarch from the Group’s shareholders, principally the Mantegazza family.

Greybull is a family office with a focus on investing in private companies across a diversified range of industry sectors. Greybull backs incumbent management teams to support and invest into established businesses and brands and creates long-term sustainable and profitable businesses. It views an investment in Monarch as a long-term opportunity in a very strong brand with great potential in all of its markets, and intends to be supportive shareholders throughout Monarch’s next chapter.

Completion of a deal remains subject to the successful outcome of ongoing negotiations, whereupon Greybull intends to provide significant capital to Monarch in order to grow the Group and to capitalize on the long established and trusted brand name.

Conditional upon the successful conclusion of these negotiations with Monarch stakeholders, a transaction is expected to complete towards the end of October.

The Monarch Group has also confirmed that each of its staff groups has agreed to major concessions on pay and terms and conditions as part of its plan to evolve into a leading scheduled European low-cost airline.

Following supportive discussions with union representatives of BAPLA, the pilots union, and UNITE, which represents its cabin crew and engineers, staff were balloted on the proposed changes and on average more than 90% voted in favour, with a proportionately high level of staff deciding to vote.

Results showed pilots voted 96% in favor with over 90% of cabin crew voting yes and engineers at Monarch Aircraft Engineering Limited (MAEL) also voting 88.43% in favor.

The changes impact all areas of the business and involve concessions of up to 30% in salaries, as well as changes to working patterns and other conditions.

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A321-231 G-OZBO (msn 1207) prepares to land at Tenerife Sur.

Monarch Airlines:

Germania to create a Swiss subsidiary to fly for Hotelplan

Germania Fluggesellschaft (Berlin) will create a new Swiss subsidiary to be based in Zurich. Operations will commence in March 2015 with one Airbus A319 for tour operator Hotelplan according to Aero.de. The new unnamed subsidiary is currently going through the AOC process as a Swiss airline.

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Airbus A319-112 D-ASTZ (msn 3019) departs from the lunar landscape of Tenerife Sur in the the Canary Islands.

Germania:

Jet2 expands at Newcastle and Belfast for the summer of 2015

Jet2.com (Jet2holidays) (Leeds/Bradford) is continuing its growth at Newcastle International Airport with the launch of four brand new destinations for the summer of 2015. The discount airline will launch new routes from NCL to Antalya (Turkey) (weekly, May 22), Larnaca (Cyprus) (weekly May 27), Malta (weekly May 21) and Zante (Zakinthos) (weekly May 27).

The company has also announced a significant expansion plans at Belfast International Airport, including new routes, an additional aircraft plus even more seats for the summer of 2015. The new routes include Prague and Rome and the sunshine hotspots of Gran Canaria and Zante.

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Boeing 757-27B G-LSAE (msn 24135) in the Jet2holidays livery (which is based on Allegiant Air’s color scheme) departs from Tenerife Sur. The 757 was previously painted in a promotional livery for Newcastle International Airport when they celebrated 75 years .

Jet2:

Ryanair to launch new Manchester winter services

Ryanair (Dubin) has announced it will launch a new Manchester winter route to/from Shannon as part of an extended Manchester winter 2014 schedule, with 24 routes in total, including four other new routes to Barcelona, Fuerteventura, Gran Canaria and Lisbon and extra frequencies to Madrid, Riga and Rome.

Copyright Photo: Paul Bannwarth/AirlinersGallery.com. Boeing 737-8AS EI-DPK (msn 33610) arrives for landing at Tenerife Sur.

Ryanair: