No it wont.

1) both BA and AF lost money overall on the Concordes – they were kept active as loss-leaders to fly the flag and promote the fleet

2)Airbus have indicated, more than once, that they were unhappy at having to produce spare parts – at a loss – in order to keep BA and AF happy.

3) looming future noise regulations would have either killed off or castrated Concorde.

It wont ever, ever fly again – because the people who could make it fly again, dont want it to.

The future of aviation is bigger aircraft with cheaper seats – shaving time off flights has always been and will always be cripplingly expensive.

MODS – if you are going to control the quality of postings in these forums, might i suggest that you control Mr H (or his lackys) appearing as a new mystery poster from time to time in order to put a positive spin on his efforts to start an airline.

It really is getting ludicrous that every few months a new mystery poster pops up who claims to have the inside track on A1 and then simply spouts either positive spin on the situation or makes excuses for Mr H.

Michael

PS Martin – the physical airline bit may be beyond your control at the moment, but if you have time to either spend in front of a computer youself (or direct others to do so on your behalf) then why dont you do something positive like finish off the A1 web-site ?

Hi,

Does anyone have any bits of advice on getting good shots of aircraft taking-off or landing. Whenever I try I usually miss the thing alltogether. My camera is a Fugifilm FinePix and has a rubbish zoom, will this affect my ability to take good shots? :confused: 🙂

Appols if this is obvious, but remember to keep the camera moving while you squeeze the trigger! – it is a point often overlooked with any type of “moving” shot.

It is an entirely natural action by all of us to follow the target with the camera and then bring the camera to a dead stop as you squeeze off the pic.

The result is either a blur and/or half an aircraft!! or you can easily end up with a blank picture and no aircraft! – this is because you frame the pic just the way you want it – then stop – then squeeze the shutter off….. and in that split second the aircraft has partially or fully roared off out of the viewfinder, BEFORE you actually take the pic.

The trick is to practice with aircraft without taking pictures tho – switch the camera off / take film out and practice tracking the aircraft and concentrate on squeezing the shutter release all the way down WITHOUT any wobbling or stopping or stuttering of the tracking movement. Keep following the aircraft with the viewfinder for a couple of seconds AFTER you have squeezed the shutter.

Once it all comes together, it feels quite normal to do it that way and you should get less movement in shots or less aircraft hanging off the edge of pics.

Appols in advance if this is irrelevent to your problem, but it may be the answer.

Michael

Neighbours crash i thought was very well filmed to be like what I imagine a real crash would be. Mind you the DC3 did still afloat alot longer (at least 1 hour) than you would expect!! Too bad about David, Liliana and Serene dying! Thank god Sky didnt Bmi star and me are thankful for that 😀

Back to Topic before we enter GD teritory!

I dont follow Neighbours, but reading your description of the plot, i guess the actors who play David, Liliana and Serene didnt agree with the terms of the new contracts offered to them by the TV company, whereas “Sky” did 🙂

Maybe they will yet sign new contracts and it will turn out to be just a bad dream in the shower, like Bobby in Dallas !!

I know i havnt been kind to A1 in the past, but as a valid excercise, Lets look at this from the point of view of Joe Public who wants to fly to or from the IOM….

What would the airport currently say about A1 ?… “not sure” perhaps or “best if you contact them directly to find out when the fly again?”

What could you find from A1’s own call centre ? …Quoting “Gingerheids” earlier post “According to the call centre it might be February the flights start again, but they hadn’t got anything in writing and they didn’t know when they would”

What about the web-site ? its been U/C for some time and it is clearly very dated by dint of the old dates and deadlines therein.

So, as a potential paying pasenger i cant either book a ticket OR hear a definate statement about when i can book one

Whatever the size and complexity of the problems A1 have, i believe that this lack of information will kill off the airline if nothing else does.

Its time for a clear situation report from the CEO via the web-site and using the media that he loves so much. Its time for an honest statement…..not to satisfy our idle curiosity here, but to keep the paying public informed and on-side. Once they start using other airlines or means of travel, they wont come back easily.

Michael

PS all this is assuming that A1 is still in operation and hasnt already died off – who knows ?

Apropos of air travel to the IOM – leaving aside for a moment the “operating difficulties” that A1 are experiencing, i would have thought that Edinburgh – IOM would have a steady queue of punters booking seats given that both Edinburgh and IOM are fairly vibrant centers for financial services (Edinburgh for insurance and investments and IOM as an off-shore tax-break centre for parking those same insurance funds and investments).

I am constantly surprised by the number of people i know who are just “off to the IOM” for meetings / golf connected with their work in all things financial.

I did honestly expect that A1 would fail to launch properley, given its history, and they didnt surprise – but I thought that they would have such full bookings that they would simply charter planes from elsewhere to cover. I never imagined a situation where they would not be flying to & from the IOM in some form.

If they have gone this long without flying (or with empty / cancelled flights) then i imagine the death bell is already ringing because of the losses they must be incurring from standing overheads.

Michael

I know everyone likes to mock poor old Martin and I guess to a certain extent it is a jealousy thing. Just how successful have all these people been in their own life to be in a position to critisise him the way they do?

However putting all the problems he has been having aside, the amount of experience he is gaining of running any sort of business, let alone an airline, at his age is priceless. How many 19 year olds are mature enough to take on any sort of responsibilty let alone run a business?

I say jolly good luck to him and whether or not his current business is successful it will give him some excellent experience for future ventures.

Yeah – im really, really jealous !

How i wish that when i was 19 i had run around town telling the world how great and succesfull i was going to be – before actually doing anything that might bring that success.

How i wish i had been so impatient for glory that i had announced many plans before making sure they were concrete.

How i wish i had ended up desparately changing my plans from one week to the next only to have to then cancel them again.

What was i doing when i was 19 ? – oh, let me think now – oh,yes i was running a business. How unusual is that at such a young age ?

He has finally, eventually chartered one plane and made a couple of flights – big deal !! – if he is still solvent and operating after 12 months, then he can claim to have run a business.

Until then, its simply borrowing cash and running up debts, as any business man would tell you.

Perhaps if he hadnt done the big “I am” so repeatedly, then people might be more charitable. So long as he embraces and flaunts the “Baby Branson” tag, he leaves himself open to critisism of his many, many mistakes

OK, I have watched this thing now on and off as it keeps popping up, let me see if I have this cronology correct:…..

Hi Canadair

Your post is a fair reflection of what has happend on this and other threads about AlphaOne. I do think, however, that it is fair to say that the reason that people are getting annoyed about it is because Martin (who used to be a regular contributer here) has devoted much energy to sounding off about how great and succesfull he is/is going to be without any credible achievements whatsoever.

Initially, Martin spent a huge amount of time and energy telling this forum and others about how he was going to be appearing on TV, how he was going to buy an Aston Martin car with the money he intended to make, how he was going to be a captain of industry etc. He has also clung onto the “Baby Branson” tag and even used it on his own web-site.

Hence the gleefull obsession that many have with detailing his continued failure to deliver any tangible results.

The simple truth is that all he has actually done is announce plans and then cancelled or changed them at the last minute. He has also arranged one demo flight for journalists using a hired jet. Thats it – total !!

This bizzare and frantic series of changes in “operational plans” that we are now seeing has left his credibility in tatters for many here and there appear to be growing suggestions that he is simply some sort of fantasist without intention or hope of delivering results.