Aer Lingus UK domestic bid

The European Commission is expected to announce on 15 November the winners of a bidding process for the Heathrow – Edinburgh route available due to the demise of bmi.  Currently British Airways has the city pair to itself and offers 11 services daily with a mixture of 767, A321, A320 and A319 aircraft.

There are two contenders, Aer Lingus (T1) and Virgin Atlantic (T3).  Just why the EU and not the British CAA is empowered to make what is a domestic decision is one of the many anomalous of air travel.  In any event a win for Aer Lingus would be a bonus for the Star Alliance carriers in a terminal which will be replaced by T2 next year, whilst for Virgin (and other T3 tenants) it would substitute for connecting business lost due to the demise of bmi. 

Aer Lingus would use its current Airbus A320 aircraft on the service whilst Virgin plans to wet lease.

It could be that the EU might decide to give Aer Lingus Edinburgh and Virgin Atlantic Aberdeen in a bid to keep everyone happy, although if he does not win both Sir Richard Branson will be somewhat upset and having lost a Moscow bid perhaps question his own airline’s tender tactics. www.aerlingus.com www.virgin-atlantic.com

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