Bmi to stop long-haul services from Manchester

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Bmi to stop long-haul services from Manchester

Nov 12, 2008

By Charles Starmer-Smith

Manchester Airport lost several long-haul services this week as Britain’s biggest airlines further focused their attention on routes out of London.

Bmi said that it was stopping all long-haul flights out of Manchester. Flights to Chicago will stop in January; services to Las Vegas, Barbados and Antigua will stop in March. Last month British Airways said that it would stop its service from Manchester to New York, BA’s only remaining international route outside London.

Bmi, which last week was taken over by the German airline, Lufthansa, has been operating long-haul services from Manchester since 2001. Up to 140 jobs based at Manchester Airport will go.

Andrew Cornish, managing director of Manchester Airport, said: “Business-class passengers are the key to the success of routes and in recent weeks premium passengers have declined as financial institutions cut business trips.”

Mr Cornish said that with the exception of Antigua, all the destinations served by Bmi are still served by other carriers.

A Bmi spokesman admitted that a lack of passengers at Manchester was behind its decision to cut the routes.

“Long-haul services from Manchester have never performed to the levels that we had hoped and we see little prospect of change,” he added.

Bmi’s two Manchester-based Airbus A330s will be moved to Heathrow for services to Cairo and Amman. Bmi will also double the number of flights it offers from Heathrow to Riyadh from January.

Source: Telegraph

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