Manchester airport loses bmi transatlantic operations

Shortly after British Airways discontinued its last long-haul flights from Manchester airport, the country’s largest regional airport was dealt another blow, this time by bmi, announcing that it would also cut all transatlantic services from Manchester.

The daily bmi service connecting Manchester with Chicago will end on 14 January, and services to Antigua, Barbados and Las Vegas will be discontinued after Easter. Air travellers who are booked on the cancelled flights will now be faced with lengthy journeys that depart from London-area airports – with the costs borne by bmi.

A bride-to-be from Stockport, Jacqui Hislop, who was depending on bmi flights when planning her wedding, has said that northerners were being treated poorly by the country’s air carriers.

“The whole family were flying out for the celebration, and most of us live less than 25 miles from Manchester airport,” she commented. “Now we’re going to have to get the train or another flight to London – and if the replacement flight is in the morning, we’ll need a night in a hotel, meaning everybody will have to take another day off work. No other country in Europe would allow its second city to be cut off from international air travel in this way.”

The woman makes a valid point, in that Air France serves 21 destinations internationally from Lyon and Lufthansa flies to 87 foreign destinations from Munich – but British Airways has cut international services from Manchester.

Thanks to www.timesonline.co.uk for the above quotes, for more information on this article please visit their website.

www.manchesterairport.co.uk