Thank you Caoimhin, finally someone who just hit the nail square on the head.

While I must admit I admire ryanair and o leary it’s important that he should not gain control of our national carrier…

Why is Aer Lingus regarded as our “national carrier”?

They won’t go bust no, but you can scratch that billion in the bank with the 700million hole in their pension fund and their new planes coming on stream to replace their longhaul fleet.

You neglect to mention the poor communication between cabin crew and the flight deck, just straight away blame the flight crew.

Also you don’t mention the CIAIAC recommendation to AENA to reassess the limitations on that taxiway at that particular holding point. The B767 was also 16m back from the hold line.

I’m not a fan of Ryanair by any means but the amount of Ryanair bashing on here is ridiculous. I know many Ryanair pilots all of whom are very professional. Nobody should judge the actions of any flight crew (of any airline) when they weren’t there in the flight deck at the time or are not in full possession of all the facts.

As far as Ryanair’s safety record goes, just look at the stats on paper and you’ll probably find they are one of the safest operators around. So yes please bitch and moan about all their ridiculous stealth charges etc…. but don’t doubt the integrity and professionalism of their crews.

Rant over

Well said Conor.

Because that’s a sure bet for turning things to loss again.

That Arab outfit can get cheap oil wholesale…some advantage to be able to fuel up from their buddies in the middle east before doing the western europe run…maybe MOL should buy a refinery in turkey to reduce fuel cost in the same way as Southwest bought one in the states…

Good point…also consider that the Arab outfit can get cheap oil wholesale in the MiddleEast..some advantage to be able to fuel up from their buddies in Saudi or the UAE before doing the western europe run…maybe MOL should buy a refinery in turkey to reduce fuel cost in the same way as Southwest airlines bought one in the states…do the maths mick

And Ryanair isn’t a success story?!

Just because we’ve heard comedians slag off Ryanair doesn’t mean the company is actually a bad one.

As for competition – RTE are reporting that Ryanair has tabled a suggestion to calm fears of monopoly. That being that in the event of the takeover happening, that they will shut down some routes from Dublin to allow competition from other airlines.

Also – in terms of Ryanair and Aer Lingus actually being in competition currently, I’m not sure they even truly are.

Etihad airlines cannot take over Aer Lingus being a non European carrier.

David are u at home in your ryanair tshirt and waving your ryanair flag.

And the branded teddy beside me…

love it:-)

Is it not the case that once they hit their reserve they are obliged to call mayday? I read that that’s the case, after a plane crashed in USA due to not identifying to ATC that they had low fuel and consequently being routed along a longer flight path to their runway.

cos they fly to Edinburgh..not some airport in the outer hebrides and your forced to travel by bus,car and yak to get to Edinburgh

You mean kind of like the way you’ve to take a bus/car/yak out of Dublin airport to get to Dublin?

Never had a problem getting from any Ryanair flight to the nearest city. There’s always good public transport.
In fact, flying to Glasgow airport with Aer Lingus leaves it at least as awkward to get into Glasgow than flying into Prestwick with Ryanair and getting the train right into Glasgow Central station.

Read the facts about the story again and also look for the information regarding other airlines involved in similar situations that day due to situation occuring on the ground and pay particular attention to the fact that the may days we’re made to ensure aircraft could land safely with at least 30mins fuel remaining on board which they are obliged to adhere to under law!

Nope!
They’re profitable! Plus Etihad are interested which would be an excellent match!

Emirates isn’t it? I think it would be interesting to see what would happen with a linkup with them, maybe extending (subsidising) Aer Lingus’s long haul operations to feed into their own. I wonder how much can the do only being allowed to own 49% though?

Its amazing how many people don’t even know the difference between Etihad and Emirates yet feel qualified to critique an airline based on one flight a year to Spain!

Sorry it is etihad, don’t know why I thought emirates, as for your basless comment john, what are you talking about?
It’s amazing how people can make asumptions about other people through one comment, il not take offence to your ill informed jab.

Yes. Who cares about that welcome on board nonsense or small matters like getting low in fuel.
Ryanair had 3 emergencies last month due to low fuel. If this is your choice, be my guest.

I don’t want Ryanair to take over aerlingus it would be terrible for airfarea out of Ireland. but Sean stop playin the same violin will ya, they diverted to another airport in Spain and circled it for an hour and still had near 1000kg of fuel on board. This is a regular occurance in most airlines.

Ryanair are apparently now in discussions which involve cutting some of the routes from Dublin allowing other airlines in to complete with what would be an aer lingus/ryanair service if they were allowed to take over.

As for the low fuel thing – we are told from Ryanair that all of those planes landed with the required 30 mins of fuel and issued maydays to highlight that they needed to land in order to ensure that. I’m sure we’d be hearing about fines if they didn’t have the required 30 mins of fuel.
If this poses a risk to passenger safety then the rules pose a risk and need to be changed.

@ Sean, dont forget about the Air France and two other major airlines that also declared the same fuel emergencies on the same day flying into the same airport as it closed due to weather conditions. They were also able to hold for nearly one hour over the airport and then divert to their alternate and still land with 1000kg of Fuel, they had more than enough but you probably wouldnt know that!

David, I like the Irish as its part of our culture. Ryanair class themselves as European now and make no announcements in Irish. And how does welcoming people onboard delay a flight? A bit of common courtesy goes a long way, plus you don’t hear of any Aer lingus flights making emergency landings due to a fuel shortage.

None of the “service” elements of Aer Lingus is worth the extra money IMO.

As for the low fuel comment, read some more of the comments here and you might get a different view of that other than the populous one.

And who cares about tired pilots who get the bare minimum rest period before they fly again??
Ryanair is a scourge.

And clearly you particularly despise your own culture, very admirable

Yes – not caring if I hear Irish on my way onto a plane is obviously a sign of despising my own culture…. what a completely stupid comment.

Like I said, any of those issues are most likely happening to pretty much any company I’m sure. Do you expect the pilots to be getting a footrub in between flights or what?!

If these are problems then it’s because the aviation laws are insufficient, not because Ryanair are pushing anyone.

Hope you’ve deep pockets cos you’ll need them to fly off this island if the O’Leary monopoly happens!