Oooh ooh ooh, I’m going to be the first to be the pedantic one! Technically Air Force 2 would only be used when the Vice President was on board, sadly Condi doesnt (yet) have her own callsign, so would have just used a normal SAM one probably.

On a more relavant note to the points raised, I remember when I was last at Liverpool, over 3 years ago now, there was a Monarch 757 that arrived, with blanked out titles, carrying injured British troops in from Iraq which I believe operated direct.

Yes, it has been over 3 years since the start of the Iraq conflict 😮

Good to see BACON actualy acting progressively as a business instead of regressively as it did in its entire life as BACX.

Are 3 flights a week enough to support what I assume is as much a business route as it is a leisure one however?

I believe its still at Southend and not Leeds. The FAA entry for it is very basic, not containing any owner details, so possibly just some transferring of ownership/leasing companies.

It does seem a bit strange that it made it onto the UK register before being taken off again though.

Sorry Andy I wasnt referring to anything A1 said, I was referring to any credible reference that a Jetstream had actualy been required.

So were there ever any Jetstreams at Coventry having TCAS fitted, or was that another figment of someone’s imagination?

Andy

I’ve never seen any actual reference to a Jetstream ever actualy being acquired and having modifications made to it for A1. All the Jetstreams into the UK recently have been being tracked quite well by various spotter groups due to the large number being flown across the pond for BlueIslands and Eastern, all of which have gone to Biggin and Humberside for their mods.

Probably the latter. Its not too often new A319s come up for lease unexpectedly. Air Berlin probably just jumped at the chance to grab a few of them.

As ever FlyBe’s definition of a base is quite loose. Any airport with a destination is usualy classified as a base!

How does this affect you if you are connecting to an international flight? I would have thought that with ordinary check in desks you checked in for the international connection at the same time as the domestic flight and just went through as a transfer passenger. Will we have to check in again at Heathrow after we land from Manchester?

Nope, the self service machines check you in all the way. Again in my experience they give you more options than you really get at the desk. You can choose the exact seat you want (not just “window” or “aisle”) plus the AA ones we used last week allowed you to view the standby list, and potentialy get on an earlier flight, again an option not necessarily given to you at a desk.