Thairetired2016

Most of Condor business came from Thomas Cook pax. Since these pax are no longer filling seats, Condor flights are now at 30 % capacity. How can they now be profitable? The requested loan is a bridging loan in the hope they can revive business or find a buyer e.g. LH.
Just a few months ago Germanwings went belly up.
If you are German speaker, read the article in today's Sueddeutsche Zeitung about the subject.

Giantaxe

Ok :-)

I see these seasonal Air Canada services from Toronto to Manchester/Glasgow/Edinburgh are run by their low cost carrier, Air Canada Rouge. They don't exactly get great reviews so I'll be interested in hearing your experiences.

scrubbedexpat091

There isn't really anything wrong with Rouge. Leg room depending on cabin and row might be a little tight though and you need to have your own device for entertainment but overall its not bad. I flew them once to California when they were flying Rouge 767's to Palm Springs from Vancouver.

If they are using the 767 to these locations in Europe from Toronto, upside is the 767 has the nice 2x3x2 seating in coach, premium cabin is 2x2x2.

Steerpike

Does that mean, the only way to view a movie is to use your own device, connected to the plane's wifi? I'm OK with that except, it opens the door to people using their phones and tablets WITHOUT headphones, which absolutely infuriates me - I don't want to listen to someone else's entertainment choice! I already get driven nuts by this when parents have their kids playing games on their phones ... they don't seem to think there's anything wrong with the incessant beeping and blooping that all these games issue! I wish the airlines would issue a stern policy on this practice - all sounds should be headphones only. It happens a lot in restaurants these days, when parents allow their kids to sit at the table with a device to keep them entertained ...

scrubbedexpat091

You have to download the app before departure (they generally do reminder announcements) then once in the air connect through the planes wifi to access the entertainment through the app. Its a pain, but Rouge is Air Canada's more leisure oriented product so not as many service as Air Canada mainline.

It is annoying when people dont use headphones, the last time I flew was on Delta and they reminded people to use headphones when using personal devices.

Giantaxe

Some hope that Virgin Atlantic might resurrect its SFO to Manchester service:

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/artic...mas-cook-slots

spouse of scouse

I first read that as Air Canada Rogue

Steerpike

Well, I made it to UK so that's a plus! . The SFO-Toronto leg was regular Air Canada, and the plane was good (normal). Had a nice entertainment center in the headrest which did allow me to kill time (but more on that below!). It seemed like in no time I was in Toronto. And Toronto airport is lovely - lots of eating places, and full of free iPads and charging stations. So my 3 hours there was pleasant. The flight to MAN was definitely on an older, sadder, worn-looking plane, with no entertainment center (as anticipated). And while the first leg was only half full and I had an empty seat next to me, this one was much fuller and I had a neighbor - much less fun. And there was a mother in front traveling alone with two YOUNG kids ... I don't know how she coped, and felt very sorry for her, but oh my - crying almost all the way. So it wasn't the easiest of flights, but probably not anything to do with the airline! And being the second leg, I was already tired and cranky, so it was unfortunate that the second flight was not as 'nice' as the first.

As noted above, the first leg of the flight was 'regular' Air Canada, and there was a lovely entertainment center in the headrest. HOWEVER - and this is now my second experience of this, so not a fluke - the guy behind me chose to play some sort of interactive 'game' on the screen. The screens are 'touch screens', which I might more accurately call, 'punch screens'. For what seemed like hours on end, my head was rocked by his punching away at the screen! Now, I'm exaggerating this a bit, but still, I could feel movement and it was terribly distracting. A few months ago I flew on a similar plane and the lady behind me was playing some card game on the screen, and my head was getting jostled! I just can't conceive how stupid it is to give people games to play in this manner; it's one thing to use a touch-screen for movie selection, volume control, etc - but to allow people to 'interact' with the screens, as in a game, is just utterly inconsiderate considering someone's head is right behind the screen, and the seatbacks are not exactly solid/rigid items! I'm going to try to complain to customer service about this ... maybe there's a number of people complaining. It's not in my nature to complain to the other person, so I didn't ask them to stop ... must be something innately British about me

I'll raise one other 'travel related' thing here ... I picked up my car and it was a decent Ford Focus, with a massive screen for GPS / etc nicely mounted in the center console. BUT NO REVERSING CAMERA! I've had reversing cameras in the US now for probably 15 years, and it's now a legal requirement. A reversing camera is 10x more useful / necessary in the UK due to parking being 10x more difficult (less space, etc) but they can't be bothered to install a simple camera! The 'costly' and difficult part of the system is already there - the display screen - so it would probably add $10 to the cost of building the car to put in a camera. Is there no movement in the UK to make reversing cameras mandatory like they are in the US? Every day here I have to reverse out of a nasty spot and I have no idea where the back of the car is ...

mikelincs

Nice story this morning on the BBC, when Thomas Cook shut up shop it was said that people were covered by ATOL, well one couple weren't, and they had paid out about £9,000 for them and guests to fly to Vegas for their wedding. So they were, understandably, upset, however, wht I presume they had hoped for when they agreed to be interviewed happened, The hotle in Vegas heard about the problems, contacted Delta who agreed to fly thme all out (Hotle were paying) and they could get married. During the ceremony they were surprised by Rod Stewart, who was appearing at the hotel) who sang them song for their wedding. Publicity won't have harmed the hotel, Rod Stewart, Delta or the BBC.

Giantaxe

Icelandair leaving SFO as well. So another European option disappears meaning Europe is likely to get a lot more expensive from here:

https://news.get.com/icelandair-leaving-san-francisco/

BEVS

What's one of them?
Sounds very 21st century.

robin1234

Gordon Barlow

Ah, they don't make cars the way they used to, Robin, more's the pity. The handle fell off one of my front doors the other day, and in fixing it the mechanic accidentally disconnected the automatic winders for the back windows. They're permanently up now, until I take it into the shop again. That just couldn't happen with the old winders.

Steerpike

Update - the return flight on Air Canada was pretty much a repeat of the outbound - 'AC Rouge' on the transatlantic part, regular AC for Toronto to SFO. What was really nice was the way Toronto handles all your US customs and immigration ahead of time ... so my long-ish layover in Toronto was productive, and when I landed in SFO it was as if I'd flown domestic - no customs, baggage, immigration to deal with. Baggage handling has come a long way and I was out on the street (well, BART) within an hour of touchdown.

Then shit happened - not 10 days after my return to the US, my mum passed away (this was expected so no real surprise)... so I had to get yet another flight out there (my 8th in 2 years). I called the same company and AGAIN got a great deal with just 7 days notice - round trip flight SFO-MAN and a car (Automatic) for under $1,000. I couldn't come anywhere close to this on any website. This time, it was SFO-LHR on BA, then LHR-MAN on BA; returning by AA through PHL. Included aisle-seat reservations and luggage in the price.

From now on - I'm never going to fly without calling these guys.

robin1234