That one was always too expensive anyway - I assume mostly used for business rather than tourism. The Dublin direct was the only accessible option for most of us, with easy connections - you could take RyanAir almost anywhere in Europe for pocket change once you got there. We just need some fresh blood and vision on the airport authority, people with more on their minds than parking. We know we can support one affordable connection - that flight was doing fine - we just didn’t compete at all against YHZ’s lobbying/incentives. I don’t think people here considered them competition - there was a taking for granted because Toronto and Montreal already had every sort of flight, so there’s nowhere for ours to go.

I think something will come back. People got attached fast. Politicians and boards of trade haven’t shut up about the impact of losing it here, and there’s a lot of pressure on YYT to wake up.

And the boys have arrived safely in Malaga. They did Air Canada St. John’s - Toronto - London Heathrow. And Easyjet London Gatwick - Malaga. I suspect Malaga would’ve been a three-leg trip even if they could’ve made it in half the time with a St. John’s - Anywhere East option.

Wonder if they have plans to fit these birds with blended winglets. The winglets are there on the AC Cargo fleet page.

https://www.aircanada.com/cargo/en/s...boeing767-300f

They should have just booked YYT-YUL on AC and then flown TS non stop from YUL to Malaga. The latter flight is literally airborne just now.

https://flightaware.com/live/flight/TSC252

Would have been easier on the body, but not so much on the wallet, probably.

And if the AC leg is delayed, then they would've be stuck at YUL. The issue with separate tickets...

At least it is easier and cheaper to get a new flight for the LGW-AGP leg if AC flight into LHR is delayed...

I feel your pain here in YOW with currently no transatlantic air service yet planned for 2022, even though YHZ has a record amount of capacity, surpassing even 2019. The YHZ air service development team are geniuses.

Yeah they’ve done very well. I’m very worried. I imagine YHZ (and most other airports) right now is working quite hard to come back from the pandemic stronger. At the same time, I wouldn’t be surprised if YYT is trying to choose between two styles of light bulb while glancing at the phone waiting for airlines to call. Honestly wouldn’t be surprised if even Toronto and Montreal are two-leg flights for us in the future lol

Realistically I think Ottawa is going to be dependent on the federal government. I would expect with COVID there are no shortage of restrictions on travel in the departments, agencies and crown corporations. Those restrictions are going to have to removed before business travel returns on those routes.

For comparison, in the late 1990s I was working in the Ottawa valley. Back then there was a daily Ottawa - Heathrow flight on both Air Canada and Canadian Airlines. They left from neighboring gates within 30 minutes of each other. If a much smaller market back then can support two daily flights today given how much Ottawa has grown it should at least support the same.

Must’ve been a cost thing, yeah. I know of one other couple (parents of a friend) going to Portugal for the winter and they absolutely refuse to stop in a third country. I’m pretty sure they’re flying direct Toronto-Lisbon and then taking land transport to whatever village their Airbnb is in. They’ve had no issue with the second leg but my friend has spent hours trying to get replacements for cancelled YYT-YYZ flights for them.

Jetlines has their first aircraft. https://twitter.com/ca_jetlines/stat...095690242?s=21

January will be interesting with Lynx and Jetlines announcing startup routes, Flair announcing new Canadian destinations, and probably Swoop joining the fun.

It only took them, what, 8 years !!!

I guess the moral of the story is if you spend 8 years pretending to start up an airline eventually you will convince someone with money to actually put money into your project and you to can get an actual aircraft.

Leaving the humor aside I do hope they do well. We need an airline based out of Vancouver that understanding the west coast. It is sad that they are using this this silly ultra-low cost business model. Once they get up and running they will hopefully see the error in their thinking and switch to following in the footsteps of someone like JetBlue.

You're giving them way too much credit.

They could be door knobs for all we know, and they would probably still get more foreign air service than YOW/YWG/YEG, etc.

Several factors. International cargo is one (lobster export is very lucrative). Higher tourism is two, especially from the European end. Location is three. Being closer to Europe means the costs of operations are much lower. It also means you can easily put a narrowbody on routes to Europe, like we are seeing.

Those 3 factors alone already heavily tilt the field in YHZ's favor.

My sentiments exactly.....

You could make a list of each airport's hits and misses (add to my list if you want):

YYT:
Pros: Closest to Europe, can easily be done on a narrowbody. Main airport for most of Newfoundland. No other hubs nearby.
Cons: At its most generous, it serves ~500,000 people (likely closer to 350,000 realistically). There's not tons of business traffic, so heavy leisure orientation.

YHZ:
Pros: Close to Europe, can be done on a narrowbody. A larger city (~400,000) plus a catchment area of hundreds of thousands more within a reasonable distance (~4hrs by car). Largest airport in Atlantic Canada, so things tend to be centralized there.
Cons: There's not many, but the dispersed nature of the larger region doesn't help compared to YOW/YWG/YEG.

YOW:
Pros: Doable to Europe on a specialized narrowbody now (A321LR/XLR). Large population centre (1.5-2m in region). National Capital means large numbers of international flyers with various embassies/staff.
Cons: Close to Montreal, quick hop to Toronto, both much larger hubs. Relative parsimony/small nature of Canadian government on world stage means that government traffic generally goes to a couple of places in Europe (London/connect in Frankfurt), so those holding their breath for a huge numbers of overseas destinations will probably be disappointed.

YWG:
Pros: The only game in town, unless you want to drive to Minneapolis six hours away. Most of the travel to/from Winnipeg is probably air travel, as it is one of the more isolated cities in North America for its size. Reasonably large regional population (~1m)
Cons: Not a huge tourist/business destination. Need to use a widebody aircraft for reliable service, which means you need to fill it with more passengers.

YEG:
Pros: It's a region with a large population (~2m). It does have some significant business connections. Some tourism potential.
Cons: Calgary, which hits the tourism and business angle better, whereas Edmonton is more government focused. You need to fill a widebody to go intercontinental and that's easier to do by connecting passengers in Calgary. The other airline in this country uses Calgary as its main hub. Did I mention Calgary? Vancouver provides better trans-Pacific connections.

Looks like WS is struggling with staff shortages just like many other airlines around the world. They announced about 15% of its network is being consolidated in January. Article also mentions the brutal cold in the west has played a factor as well. (YYC for example has had hefty de-icing lines).

https://www.westjet.com/en-ca/news/2...variant-impact

Doesn't seem like AC has had any major issues, yet?

The labour shortages are less acute here because of the nature of the Canadian travel market. Especially this year given the hassles (COVID testing/Omicron) of returning from a sun destination/overseas. Slack in the demand south has allowed crews to be more available, even if COVID tests require people to be off.

Aside from Christmas, winter is the doldrums for domestic demand. Canada's population is more concentrated into a handful of pockets across the country, so up-gauging to larger aircraft provides a bigger boost to capacity without huge increases in labour required.

I guess you haven't experienced a WS or Encore aircraft wait an hour for a crew to park it, let alone get bags and the rest. I see it daily at work

It's true. Domestic travel for the federal government while international travel is still non-existent. AC still have AC888/889 reserved for YOW-LHR, so hopefully it's back in 2023. Clearly with YVR being (at this point) 1x 789 & 1x 788 for summer 2022, it's rather obvious that 2nd flight on the 788 would eventually be for YOW. YVR's temporary 2x could then easily be consolidated back to a HD 77W like it used to be, thereby keeping YVR capacity about the same. YYT's LHR slot got sent to YUL.

There is no doubt geography favours YHZ. But on the cargo side, the Airport Authority have invested heavily in making that a reality and it's paid off not just with international freighter service, but also indirectly benefits the international pax service side. It's highly unlikely all of YHZ's transatlantic "wins" are purely due to luck.

Unfortunately, they'll be flying from YYZ and offering sun routes, probably florida (like sunwing).

I don't think that is where the Ottawa slot was allocated.

Historically Air Canada has had three slots that work from a timing perspective for Western Canada. Calgary and Vancouver each with one daily. The third slot has been used for a second daily to Vancouver some years. In the past it was put on Edmonton. Some years it has been split between the three. Way back in the 90s I think it was used on Winnipeg for a few days a year.

Was the Ottawa slot not re-allocated to Montreal?

Oh. If they are going to pretend to be a Vancouver airline that is focused on Toronto I offer no support, just indifference.

That is a market well served by just about every Canadian airline in the industry with a suitable aircraft. They are adding nothing new by entering that market. Who cares if it works out or not?