The leasing prices may of dropped but still the costs of financing the new aircraft were high. The renewal was a costly business and with the condition the market was in, the output of capital was still a hell of a lot. The MDs and Tristars might of been costing a great amount of money but the costs involved would of probably outweighed the risks and costs of leasing new aircraft.

They are always close to being grounded though this seems quite serious. Looks like poor management. Trying to make the airline something it cannot be at the moment in the current market, new long haul and short haul services that are just not needed. Another good case of slim down or die.

Only further government assistance will help them survive, hopefully they can rescue them.

Aurigny will lease the Titan BAe 146 for the weekends during the summer period, they will fly to Stansted and Manchester.

Anyway, nice pictures. Love the Croatia Airlines picture.

I think I said something about this recently in another post but it is very unlikely Air Canada will take on the A340-500 because they have no current need for them as a result of bankruptcy. They were supposed to go on the Toronto-Hong Kong route I believe.

Sorry there ACA345.

Developing a superior service and image is all part of it as well. Look at airlines around the world that are making a profit, they have excellent service. If you have the money and have the backing of a wealthy government who want you to help build a successful tourism industry and traffic through Dubai to last long after the oil, a superior image is then essential to build up the strong trade-that is what Emirates has.

If you look at anything in the U.A.E from the buildings to the airline they all have an excellent and superior looks built out of the wealth and vision of many people in the country.

Anyway, that is just the way I see it. Maybe someone else could explain in more detail the key to Emirates success?

Is anybody interested in buying Olympic? It seems that although the government is making an effort to turn around the loss and restructure the company, there are a lot of setbacks. The EU lawsuit against them with illegal state aid plus constant the unions opposition to job redundancies through job losses are a huge setback for the airline and cannot be doing any to help bring in potential buyers.
I think privatisation is needed and a new airline to be launched out Olympic. Seems to be the logical step being taken by the government at the moment

ACA345,
The *Rumour* suggests a mixed order 777-200LR and 777-300ER or the latter alone.

LBARULES,
Qatar Airways, Gulf Air, Emirates, Oman Air and a few other Middle Eastern carriers are in a period of tremendous growth. They can afford the “best looking planes in the classiest colour schemes” to some extent because they have the money. The huge growth in passenger numbers especially on their hub and spoke system is helping to grant them this plus lesser costs compared to other airlines. How they get such fast and amazing growth in terms of profit, aircraft/destinations and reputation is beyond me though.

I still think 43 A380s altogether for Emirates seems very optimistic, the airline is under huge growth though really where does it plan to fly that many widebodies? The market conditions are good but that is still a huge number for the airline. They must have very ambitious plans, maybe leasing or something similar? Could be preparing in advance for a rainy day…