Having looked at the VS Source, it seems Virgin position their aircraft between the various UK bases on a regular basis - for varying reasons (maintenance / aircraft swaps etc).
Anyone know how this works at a slot congested airport like LHR? It's widely stated that LHR is running at around 98% capacity, so there is next to nothing to play with, especially when the weather is not kind. Are Virgin using one half of a slot pair (i.e. a landing or takeoff) when they position aircraft to / from LHR - or to a lesser extent LGW as that's pretty busy?
What happens if Virgin want to position from LGW to LHR at a time when LHR is very busy (i.e. pretty much anytime, but there are of course peaks and troughs). Does HAL use the spare 2% of capacity for cases like this or can airlines be told "no, we're full at that time of day"? Obviously I appreciate some positioning flights are planned well in advance, but there must be some fairly last minute ones that occur when aircraft go technical & VS need to decide which flights take priority for fleet resources.
Anyone know how this works at a slot congested airport like LHR? It's widely stated that LHR is running at around 98% capacity, so there is next to nothing to play with, especially when the weather is not kind. Are Virgin using one half of a slot pair (i.e. a landing or takeoff) when they position aircraft to / from LHR - or to a lesser extent LGW as that's pretty busy?
What happens if Virgin want to position from LGW to LHR at a time when LHR is very busy (i.e. pretty much anytime, but there are of course peaks and troughs). Does HAL use the spare 2% of capacity for cases like this or can airlines be told "no, we're full at that time of day"? Obviously I appreciate some positioning flights are planned well in advance, but there must be some fairly last minute ones that occur when aircraft go technical & VS need to decide which flights take priority for fleet resources.