Dublin Airport

scorpioishere

Mc Love wrote: »

Blame the company - not the people that make sure selfish people like you get home!

Flights are still leaving EI634 boarding in 5 mins

Me selfish i don't think so and for your info I don't travel with Aer Lingus unfortunately. You might be boarding the plane but will probably get out in 20 mins.

Mc Love

scorpioishere wrote: »

Me selfish i don't think so and for your info I don't travel with Aer Lingus unfortunately. You might be boarding the plane but will probably get out in 20 mins.

Not boarding, but the people that work on the planes have lives too, so maybe you should be more grateful.

Glad you dont travel with EI - they are probably better off without ya :P

jos28

Aer Lingus cancelled my son's flight from Birmingham due to leave at 20.15. Amazingly the Ryanair flight that was scheduled for 19.00 approx is going ahead. :mad::mad::mad:
Luckily my son has a ferry ticket and it trying to make his way to Holyhead as we speak. Fingers crossed, I just want him home.

scorpioishere

Mc Love wrote: »

Not boarding, but the people that work on the planes have lives too, so maybe you should be more grateful.

Glad you dont travel with EI - they are probably better off without ya :P

Glad they doesn't have me otherwise i will teach them how to have good customer service and how to give information.

Irish Steve

irish1967 wrote: »

The plane due to go to Vienna from Dublin is probably in Cork or Shannon. It could still get to Vienna empty. The planes will be using this Dublin cancellation period to reposition themselves i assume.

No good blaming Aer Lingus. all the airlines are cancelling flights, through necessity, not because they want to. There were a lot of aircraft in the air due to land at Dublin between 9:40 and 13:00, and even more that ended up having to wait where they were until they could be certain of getting back into Dublin, or to be pedantic, as certain as they could be of getting into either Dublin or an acceptable alternative that could take them, bearing in mind that today is one of the busiest of the year, so landing slots and gate availability at most other airports will be limited, as they too have a full schedule. If a car has to park up because it can't get to a specific place, that's not a massive problem, it's not so easy to park an aircraft if it's getting short of fuel or there's nowhere to put it after it lands.

Once they've diverted, they then have to decide if it's better to sit at the diversion with passengers on board still, and hope to get to Dublin later, or offload everyone, and send them by whatever means is available to Dublin, while they then wait for things to improve at Dublin so they can get the aircraft back here to carry on as soon as possible after arrival. That depends on slots, gates and the like at Dublin, and also on the crew having sufficient time still available in their day to do the flight, which is not always certain, there are a lot of restrictions on crew duty time for good reasons. There are only so many fuel trucks and drivers, extra aircraft needing fuel out of schedule just have to wait, and most handling agents don't have spare staff on days like today, so that's more delays.

The airlines then have to reorganise the slots, gates and everything else at the destinations, some of which have time restrictions on their opening hours, and make sure that they will get back to Dublin without further disruption,

The real issue that needs to be addressed is why the DAA needed 4 hours to clear a relatively minor snowfall. Part of the problem will be insufficient equipment, possibly a shortage of available and trained crew, as most of their snow clearers were either on duty or operational overnight, and probably a few other factors as well. DAA have proved themselves to be just about adequate at running Ireland's largest pub, but their skills at designing, planning and operating the largest airport in the country are at times less than stellar.

Ryanair and Aer Arran have also cancelled flights, and all the airlines will be working late tonight to try and get as many people to their intended destinations as possible.

And before I get shouted at, I don't work for Aer Lingus, or any other airline, but I do have professional flying qualifications, and have worked at Dublin airport in the past, so I do know quite a bit about what goes on there.

Steve

irish1967

Was in NO way blaming Aer Lingus.

Heres a link to EIN flights currently in the air

http://www.flightradar24.com/index.php?fa=1&heightmaxunit=ft&heightminunit=ft&speedmaxunit=knots&speedminunit=knots&airplfil=ein&airplfiltype=callsign

drdeadlift

Some people dont see the safety aspect to the airport closure.

irish1967

Exactly... if a plane skids off the runway on take off or landing the DAA would be critised for not closing. I know which i would prefer.

The Muppet

I live 3 miles from the airport and I don't know how they got any flights out today at all, The roads are armageddon around here and its snowed on and off all day and its snowing heavily now.

Safety has to be the priority, those complaining now would have a lot more to complain about if something dreadful happened.

ciaran76

There now and can't see 30 metres ahead of me.

Mc Love

Said the braking action was 4 and dont know if runway will remain open

ciaran76

Snow falling off the new terminal like a mini avalanche. Scary stuff.

Bullseye1

How will all these cancellations effect flights leaving the country in the coming days?

Mc Love

I hope they wont - due to go to JFK tomorrow morning

Bullseye1

Mc Love wrote: »

I hope they wont - due to go to JFK tomorrow morning

Good luck with your flight. I'm due to fly to Zurich on Monday and then onto Moscow.

Mc Love

Same to you Bullseye1 - i'd say you will be okay Monday (but judging on the recent snowfall - who the f**k knows)

Anita Blow

I believe Dublin Airport will be open on Christmas morning to get people home. A relative works there and has volunteered to work in the morning

delw

sisters flight cancelled from stanstead,trying to book another flight but not looking good :(

Irish Steve

Closing agian now for " an hour", but if the present snow doesn't ease, it could be a lot longer, the problem is a line of continuous showers coming ashore off the Irish Sea, the "Isle of Man" streamer, and no sign of it easing. I was within a mile of the airport earlier and there was nothing at all coming down.

6ix

Good luck to all flying over the next couple of days. Someone on the ATC just said the airport will be closed for another four hours.

My girlfriend's flight from Edinburgh - Dublin tonight has just been cancelled too, sh1tty times.:(

Poly

Twitter reporting that Shannon has run out of De-icer.

Mc Love

Ryanair -really are scum! Asking the govt to investigate closures?!

WallyGUFC

Why don't they try reach some agreement to divert all the flights to Shannon/Cork/Belfast instead of working Christmas Day? I know they're the opposite sides of the country but tis a small auld country.

jos28

delw wrote: »

sisters flight cancelled from stanstead,trying to book another flight but not looking good :(

I reckon her best bet would be to get on a train to Holyhead. Irish Ferries are doing their best to accommodate everyone

chrabo

Dublin airport close till 23h

dfx-

jos28 wrote: »

Aer Lingus cancelled my son's flight from Birmingham due to leave at 20.15. Amazingly the Ryanair flight that was scheduled for 19.00 approx is going ahead. :mad::mad::mad:

Nice to see Ryanair have a sense of humour about the chances of that flight:D

Anita Blow

WallyGUFC wrote: »

Why don't they try reach some agreement to divert all the flights to Shannon/Cork/Belfast instead of working Christmas Day? I know they're the opposite sides of the country but tis a small auld country.

I'm not sure. I know a lot of staff have volunteered to work on the day which I think is great.

OfficeStuff

Oh I missed the snow boards all day! Hallo from the Radisson Blu Dublin Airport. Don't be too hard on Aer Lingus or Ryanair. We were scheduled to fly SAS to Stockholm at 12.00 today. On the way out to the airport, heard on radio that airport was closed until 1.30. We expected this, thanks to MT and all the others on this board, and so were well prepared to be in the airport until 4 or 5 or maybe 6. Didn't expect the level of snow.

They started pushing flights out at about 1.10 and taking flights in at about 1.30. Loads of airlines had diverted to various places to wait for the 1.30 opening. At 1.30, they then re-scheduled us to leave at 16.00. Went to the ** Smoking Area ** I can not believe they have one!! and then to the gate for 16.00. Plane came in at 15.30 and passengers, who had left Stockholm at 9.30 Irish time (scheduled time 8.30) disembarked. They made a herculean effort to get us on board. Captain told us that if we weren't in the air by 16.25 we would have to divert to Oslo to change crew, as the crew would be past the allowed time.

16.25 came and went as we sat on the runway in a snowstorm waiting for the de-icing to be done. After about 20 mins it was obvious the runway was going to be closed with snow. We had some limited internet access and saw tweets that planes were still leaving and some coming in. Then that AerLingus had cancelled all flights after 4.00 pm.

At 17.00 captain came on again, now it was too late to even get to Oslo so everybody off the plane. They told us they'd be happy to pay for a hotel, but we'd have to make our own arrangements. And we should be happy about that since so many other people were stuck in the airport in Frankfort, Paris etc. Rather inappropriate Swedish humour methinks.

So here we are, in the Radisson Blu (they had loads of cancellations as people coming in couldn't get in), have to get to airport for 6.00 am and hope it won't be freezing fog stopping us this time.

End of report from the front line, merry xmas all

red menace

OfficeStuff wrote: »

Oh I missed the snow boards all day! Hallo from the Radisson Blu Dublin Airport. Don't be too hard on Aer Lingus or Ryanair. We were scheduled to fly SAS to Stockholm at 12.00 today. On the way out to the airport, heard on radio that airport was closed until 1.30. We expected this, thanks to MT and all the others on this board, and so were well prepared to be in the airport until 4 or 5 or maybe 6. Didn't expect the level of snow.

They started pushing flights out at about 1.10 and taking flights in at about 1.30. Loads of airlines had diverted to various places to wait for the 1.30 opening. At 1.30, they then re-scheduled us to leave at 16.00. Went to the ** Smoking Area ** I can not believe they have one!! and then to the gate for 16.00. Plane came in at 15.30 and passengers, who had left Stockholm at 9.30 Irish time (scheduled time 8.30) disembarked. They made a herculean effort to get us on board. Captain told us that if we weren't in the air by 16.25 we would have to divert to Oslo to change crew, as the crew would be past the allowed time.

16.25 came and went as we sat on the runway in a snowstorm waiting for the de-icing to be done. After about 20 mins it was obvious the runway was going to be closed with snow. We had some limited internet access and saw tweets that planes were still leaving and some coming in. Then that AerLingus had cancelled all flights after 4.00 pm.

At 17.00 captain came on again, now it was too late to even get to Oslo so everybody off the plane. They told us they'd be happy to pay for a hotel, but we'd have to make our own arrangements. And we should be happy about that since so many other people were stuck in the airport in Frankfort, Paris etc. Rather inappropriate Swedish humour methinks.

So here we are, in the Radisson Blu (they had loads of cancellations as people coming in couldn't get in), have to get to airport for 6.00 am and hope it won't be freezing fog stopping us this time.

End of report from the front line, merry xmas all

Good to hear from the Front line
Hope you get going tomorrow
Enjoy the Rasdison!

angel01

My brothers flight from Birmingham is now cancelled, he doesn't think he will get home now so will have to stay there for Christmas.

:(:(