Bahrain Airports Company (BAC) is well advanced with plans for further expansion at the international airport at Muharraq, in the north of the island, an official told AIN at MEBA 2012 in Dubai.
“Bahrain Airports Company is planning a major project to expand the passenger terminal building as well as a major service center,” said Mohamed Yousif Al-Binfalah, CEO of BAC. “We have already developed infrastructural plans. We hope that by 2013, we will begin the work.”
Business aircraft passengers and crew will be able to clear all U.S. customs, immigration and agriculture procedures at Ireland’s Shannon Airport starting on March 1, following the long-anticipated approval granted yesterday by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. The arrangements allow non-U.S. operators and their passengers to fly direct from Shannon to any airport in the U.S. as if they were making a domestic flight.
The ATR 72-500 was approved to start operations at London City Airport in early February and has entered service with Irish regional airline Aer Arann on its route to the Isle of Man. The UK approval process requires a series of test flights to establish that the aircraft and operator can cope with the downtown airport’s 5.5-deg approach and its 3,900-foot runway, while also meeting strict noise limits.
FBO Ireland started business jet handling at Dublin Airport last month, operating out of the main terminal. The Shannon-based group is now negotiating to open a new executive facility at Dublin. Next month, FBO Ireland is scheduled to start business aircraft handling at Ireland’s Cork Airport.
One of Aer Arann’s busiest areas must be its personnel department: “We have experienced huge growth in the past two years, particularly in flight crew and operations. Given our current rate of growth, flight crew [numbers] have grown above 30 percent per year and will continue at 15 to 20 percent,” according to head of operations John Halpin.
Aer Arann performs its own line maintenance, with base checks contracted to TAT at Dinard in northern France, said COO Peter McKenna. Components go to sister company Aer Arann Islands in Connemara. The airline employs 25 maintenance staff, and generally adds two or three people with each additional aircraft.
In an industry where airlines have all too often been run by aviators instead of businessmen, Aer Arann chief executive Padraig O’Ceidigh (pronounced ‘O’Kaygee’) has brought a cautious–if not typically Irish–approach to the airline. “The most important word in business is ‘no’,” he asserts.
How would you feel if criminals tried to use your aircraft for international drug smuggling, dragging you and your company into a long-running legal drama? Irish businessman Jim Mansfield knows exactly how this feels.
ExxonMobil Aviation is no longer providing fuel services on the Bravo ramp at Ireland’s Dublin Airport. After performing a risk assessment of the ramp’s lighting conditions, ExxonMobil determined that it would be safer to fuel general aviation aircraft on the airport’s main commercial ramp at night.
A Cessna Citation VI owned by a prominent Irish businessman was caught up in a major drug bust on September 26, when Belgian police impounded the aircraft at Kortrijk-Wevelgem Airport and arrested its crew. More than 110 pounds of heroin (valued at $13 million) was seized as an undisclosed passenger tried to board the jet at Kortrijk, which is close to the border with France.
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