Tag Archives: BRS

NATS installs new digital flight strip system at Bristol Airport

NATS, the UK’s leading air traffic services provider, has successfully introduced its new Hub and Spoke Electronic Flight Progress Strip (EFPS) system at Bristol Airport.

The new system will incorporate Bristol Airport’s tower and approach services that handle over 75,000 flights per year carrying more than 8.5 million passengers to destinations across Europe and beyond.

The roll-out follows the system’s previous successful implementations at Belfast International, Belfast City and Farnborough Airports when controllers stopped using paper strips to record aircraft information in favour of electronic flight progress data using new Hub and Spoke system architecture.

While the concept of electronic strips is not new, all NATS’ Hub and Spoke systems link to a centralised set of data servers to drive operational screens in connected airports. This removes the need for every airport air traffic control tower to host its own locally-installed servers and the provision of individual data links at a specific site.

The new electronic flight information system delivers significant benefits in infrastructure costs as well as enhancing the way in which airport towers can share data, thanks to its ability to transfer and share data from the same single database. In Bristol’s case, EFPS will also improve the airport’s stand-management system after it successfully passed integration testing.

The new system, which will also be introduced at Southampton, Cardiff and London City airports, means that controller workload is reduced; bringing safety and capacity benefits as controllers have more time to handle more flights and monitor increased levels of air traffic.

Thanks to Bristol Airport for the Air Traffic Control Tower photo.

New administration building at Bristol Airport takes shape

The work on the new administration building at Bristol Airport begun some weeks back and is already taking shape, located on the south side of the airport the new building with replace the current administration building, or old terminal as it is also known.

The office structure, which will comprise of three storeys, will house the project teams and senior management, alongside other services such as meeting and training rooms.

It is the latest project in a series of developments that are set to modernise and expand the site, and demonstrates Bristol Airport’s continued investment into sustainable, low carbon systems. The new building has been designed with energy efficiency in mind, with a carbon emission reduction of 23% over facility-building regulations.

TUI announce new winter routes from Bristol Airport

TUI UK, the UK’s largest holiday operator, has launched its winter programme and reveals growth plans for Bristol Airport with new weekly routes to Keflavik, Dalaman and Naples and additional flights to Tenerife for the 2019 season.

The winter 2019 programme will continue to offer holidaymakers in the South West of England more choice and flexibility than ever before, with an increased capacity of nearly 8,000 additional seats at Bristol Airport. Continuing to recognise that not everyone wants to holiday for 7 or 14 nights, passengers will also have the option of 10 and 11 night holidays to Malaga in Spain and Palma in Majorca at the end season of next winter. There will also be an additional day added to the flight programme for flights from Bristol Airport to Tenerife.

The move to introduce these routes is part of TUI’s strategy to ensure customers across the UK can fly from their local airport and stay at the best hotels in some of the most exciting destinations around the world, including TUI flagship properties such as the TUI Sensatori Resort Tenerife.

Bristol Airport celebrates record month of passengers travelling through the airport

Nearly one million passengers passed through Bristol Airport’s terminal last month, making August 2018 the busiest month in the history of Bristol Airport.

The record total of 951,973 passengers took traffic during the summer to over 1.8 million – a 6.7 per cent increase on 2017. This growth continues to generate new jobs, with Bristol Airport taking on 100 new employees since the start of the year, with further opportunities available with business partner organisations across the 196 hectare site.

The record-breaking summer follows an eighth consecutive year of growth for England’s third largest regional airport. Holiday operators TUI and Thomas Cook have performed particularly strongly, with the charter sector up 23 per cent on last year, while easyJet has also enjoyed double digit growth at Bristol. High performing destinations include Turkey, Tunisia and Egypt, with new routes to Gothenburg, Genoa, Seville and Cologne also contributing to the increase in passengers.

A new Master Plan is currently being prepared and will set out potential development required to handle up to 20 million passengers per annum from the existing runway by the mid-2040s. The first phase of this growth will be facilitated through the submission of a planning application to North Somerset Council later this year.

In June, Bristol Airport was named ‘Best Airport in Europe’ in the 5-10 million passengers category at the annual awards dinner held by European airports association, ACI Europe.

easyJet celebrates 15 years at Bristol Airport

easyJet celebrated the 15th anniversary of its base at Bristol Airport this week,  the largest base outside of London.

Celebrations took place throughout the day on the 28th August 2018 at Bristol airport, including an impressive balloon arch and cake for passengers at the easyJet check-in desk, and one lucky passenger won a fantastic prize of 2 return flights on easyJet to any of its destinations.

The crew room was filled with decorations and party food for pilots and cabin crew operating the day’s flights. Ali Gayward, easyJet UK Country Manager, and Dave Lees, Bristol Airport Chief Executive also joined the celebrations alongside cabin crew including Kate Bayley and Suzie Davies, who are proud to have been operating flights from Bristol with easyJet since the base opened 15 years ago.

easyJet is proud to be Bristol’s biggest airline, having flown over 53 million passengers since operations started there. With 15 based aircraft and over 650 crew members, easyJet provides Bristol passengers with 69 domestic and international routes, including the most popular destination Geneva.

bmi Regional and Air France announce new codeshare partnership

bmi Regional and Air France have announced a brand new codeshare partnership on bmi’s Bristol to Paris service. The partnership, which commences from 14th May 2018, will provide business and leisure customers from Bristol Airport with access to 25 french cities via Air France’s hub at Paris Charles de Gaulle Airport.

The news comes less than a month after bmi announced that it would be increasing the frequency of its Paris CDG service from Bristol Airport. The airline currently flies twice daily between Bristol and Paris but, in response to customer demand the airline will be adding a further flight three times a week – on Mondays, Wednesdays and Thursdays from the 14 May 2018.

As well as opening up new destinations to the South West, the new codeshare partnership strengthens both airlines’ network presence at Bristol Airport and is also expected to benefit inbound tourism to the local area and economy.

New airline Powdair to launch at Bristol Airport

New airline powdair will launch in December 2017 with ticket sales now on sale through its website powdair.ski with a winter schedule that links Sion Airport with eight destinations in the UK, one of those being Bristol Airport.

The skiers airline, based in Sion – the heart of Switzerland’s winter sport region, the Valais, will offer skiers and snowboarders across the UK, Northern Germany and the Benelux Countries the chance to reach some of the world’s most famous winter sports resorts quickly and efficiently.

Flights commence from December 14, 2017 and will significantly cut transfer times to some of Switzerland’s most popular ski resorts for winter sports enthusiasts including Zermatt, Verbier, Saas Fee, Crans Montana and Nendaz. A variety of transfer options from Sion Airport to onward destinations are available to book at the point of ticket purchase, including shared and private journeys to the major resorts in the region.

Initial reports were that the airline would use a Tradeair Fokker 100 on the route but since then we have heard the airline may be using a leased aircraft painted in a bespoke Powdair livery, more information to follow once we know more.

Champions League Final flights take passenger numbers to record levels

During the weekend of Friday 2nd to Sunday 4th June Bristol Airport saw an extra 15,000 passengers en route to the UEFA Champions League final in Cardiff which was one of the biggest sporting events in the world this year.

In total well over 100,000 passengers travelled through Bristol Airport over the course of the weekend, making it the busiest in the airport’s history. 170,000 fans made the trip to watch Real Madrid play against Juventus on Saturday evening, or simply to join in the Champions League Festival activities based around the city of Cardiff over the weekend.

We understand UEFA followed a two airport strategy for the travel arrangements of fans, with Bristol Airport the designated port of entry for followers of Real Madrid, and Cardiff Airport the primary airport for Juventus fans. Months of planning and preparation went into ensuring those flying in for the final received a warm welcome and were able to continue their onward journey to Cardiff quickly and efficiently.

An extra 200 aircraft, including private and corporate jets, scheduled flights and special charter flights, arrived at Bristol Airport bringing supporters into the UK before the match in Cardiff.

British Airways first flights take off from Bristol Airport

This Saturday 20th May 2017 marks the launch of British Airways flights from Bristol Airport again after a period of 10 years absent from the airport. The flights operate on Saturdays to Florence, Ibiza and Malaga using 3 Embraer 190 aircraft and 1 Embraer 170 aircraft with spacious cabins and two abreast seating so every passenger has an aisle or window seat.

British Airways are pleased to be restarting flights from Bristol and offering customers competitively priced flights on popular routes with our national airline. Depending on the success of the routes further routes may be added to the British Airways schedules.

The flights operate as follows:

Florence

  • Arrives: 12:25pm – E170
  • Departs: 13:10pm – E170

Ibiza

  • Arrives: 15:10pm – E190
  • Departs: 15:55pm – E190

Malaga

  • Arrives: 15:15pm – E190
  • Departs: 16:00pm – E190

Palma

  • Arrives: 15:45pm – E190
  • Departs: 16:30pm – E190

More details on all flights from Bristol Airport can be found on our Mayflys page.

Bristol Airport to welcome Real Madrid fans for Champions League Final 2017

Bristol Airport is set to welcome fans of Real Madrid between Friday 2nd June and Sunday 4th June 2017 for the Champions League Final which is being held at Cardiff. The Juventus fans will be flying into Cardiff Airport seperating them from the Real Madrid fans.

At the moment we have heard the following flights will be operated by Vueling during this period, these times and flights may change nearer to the date with more added, once we have more information this page will be updated.

Update: As well as Vueling BAS have been informed that Air Europa, Air Nostrum, Iberia, Iberia Express, Privilege Style and SATA Azores may be operating flights to Bristol during this period. More info as it becomes available.

Madrid

Friday 2nd June

  • Vueling – MAD-BRS 05.00-06.05
  • Vueling – MAD-BRS 07.00-08.05
  • Vueling – MAD-BRS 11.00-12.05

Saturday 3rd June

  • Vueling – MAD-BRS 04.20-05.25
  • Vueling – MAD-BRS 10.15-11.20

Sunday 4th June

  • Vueling – BRS-MAD 07.55-11.05
  • Vueling – BRS-MAD 21.40-00.50
  • Vueling – BRS-MAD 22.55-02.05

Barcelona

Friday 2nd June.

  • Vueling – BCN-BRS 22.30-23.45

Sunday 3rd June.

  • Vueling – BRS-BCN 15.00-18.05

Information Source: http://www.forums4airports.com/threads/4230/

Updated 24 May 2017

IB2866 MAD 2130-xxxx BRS (01/06/17)
VY7760 MAD 0700-0805 BRS A320 (02/06/17)
VY7762 MAD 0745-0850 BRS A320 (02/06/17)
VY7764 MAD 1200-1305 BRS A320 (02/06/17)
IBS9686 MAD 1815-xxxx BRS A320 (02/06/17)
IBS9702 MAD 1840-xxxx BRS A320 (02/06/17)
VY7750 BCN 2230-xxxx BRS A320 (02/06/17)
IB2868 MAD 0215-xxxx BRS
IB2908 MAD 0230-xxxx BRS
IB2864 MAD 0240-xxxx BRS
IB2856 MAD 0245-xxxx BRS
IBS9998 MAD 0255-xxxx BRS A320
IBS9690 MAD 0300-xxxx BRS A320
IBS9688 MAD 0310-xxxx BRS A320
IB2858 MAD 0315-xxxx BRS
PVG1191 MAD 0400-xxxx BRS
VY7762 MAD 0420-xxxx BRS A320
UX957 MAD 0500-xxxx BRS
VY4010 MAD 0500-xxxx BRS
UX625 MAD 0500-xxxx BRS
UX821 MAD 0545-xxxx BRS
PVG8857 MAD 0635-xxxx BRS
PVG9963 MAD 0645-xxxx BRS
UX853 MAD 0645-xxxx BRS
ZI973 MAD 0710-xxxx BRS A320
ZI985 MAD 0720-xxxx BRS A320
VY7752 BCN 0725-xxxx BRS A320
VY7762 MAD 0745-0850 BRS A320
PVG9373 MAD 0800-xxxx BRS
UX941 MAD 0800-xxxx BRS
TDR263 MAD 0830-xxxx BRS
YW2830 MAD 0900-xxxx BRS
UX812 MAD 0900-xxxx BRS
YW2010 MAD 1000-xxxx BRS
VY7764 MAD 1015-xxxx BRS A320
UX929 MAD 1125-xxxx BRS
UX844 MAD 1140-xxxx BRS
UX889 MAD 1150-xxxx BRS

Information Source: http://footballcharters.blogspot.co.uk/2017/05/uefa-champions-league-final-3-june-2017.html