GENERAL

The time has come once more (and all too soon) to reflect on the happenings at Gatwick over the last twelve months. Sadly, the year may well be mainly remembered for the drone incident in the run-up to the Christmas rush. This lasted from around 21.00 on Wednesday 19/12 through to roughly 06.00 on Friday 21/12 after sightings of "multiple" drones over Gatwick's runway. The incident affected around 110,000 passengers, many of whom had their Christmas plans completely ruined. Gatwick was obviously totally unprepared for such an event and it was not until the Army was called in with its specialised equipment that the drones disappeared and the airport could return to normal operations. Since then, the airport has reportedly spent £5 million on unspecified equipment to ensure that there is no repeat. The hunt for the perpetrators soon turned into complete farce as the police arrested a Crawley couple, who were promptly vilified by the national press, only to then have to release them without charge, as they were completely innocent and one senior officer even questioning whether there had been any drones over the runway in the first place! As it is panto season, the Chief Constable of Sussex then admitted recently that some of the drone sightings could have been the force's own drones (oh no he didn't! oh yes he did!) On a serious note, I remain hopeful that those responsible for this criminal act will be caught and receive the maximum five-year sentence available to the courts. The whole event has, however, served as a warning to all airports worldwide as to how such a small, cheap and easily obtained device can bring a major airport to a complete standstill.

I had just finished typing the previous paragraph when the news came through that GIP had sold a controlling stake in Gatwick Airport to the French company Vinci Airports. How this will affect current plans is largely an unknown at present, though at least Vinci have plenty of experience at running and developing airports as they already own 45 of them in 12 countries, though none are near the size of Gatwick.

Having so far failed to gain permission to build a second runway, Gatwick has come up with an ingenious plan to create more slots by bringing the current emergency runway (08L/26R) into use for take-offs by medium size airliners (eg up to A320 and B737 family aircraft). The basic idea is to widen the emergency runway by 12 metres, allowing 10 to 15 short-haul flights to depart per hour. The airport's current agreement with the local councils to remain a single-runway airport expires in August next year and, if planning permission is granted in 2020, this elegant solution could be in place by 2025 and would also involve the construction of a new pier accommodating several new gates.

While we wait to see if this bold plan comes to fruition, various other infrastructure improvements are planned or in progress. A new pier is scheduled for the North Terminal featuring six more gates, while work is well advanced on the Boeing hangar. This will primarily handle B38Ms and B787s and the last I heard it was due to open in 1Q19. All the above comes against the background of an airport that handles an increasing number of passengers year-on-year. The last figures that I saw showed that Gatwick serves 228 destinations in 74 countries, while handling 45 million passengers on 282,000 flights per year..

Just when you think you have managed to avoid the dreaded word Brexit, it rears its ugly head. As things stand, it is far from clear how this will affect the airline industry in 2019 with the so-called experts predicting everything from UK airlines being banned from flying to Europe to there being no change to the current arrangements. Several airlines have taken steps to avoid potential problems, the most notable of which is easyJet who have so far placed no less than 130 (so far) of their fleet on the Austrian register under the guise of easyJet Europe, leaving 161 registered in the UK. Following suit, though in a less dramatic fashion, have been Wizz Air with Wizz Air UK, SAS with SAS Ireland and Ryanair with Ryanair UK and, though probably unconnected, Ryanair Sun.

Turning to the aircraft that we saw here during the year, the number of new types or sub-types was extremely disappointing amounting to a mere two, the AW169 & EMB545 (though some may also count the A220), compared to eleven in 2017. Airbus NEOs & Boeing MAXs have become more common, with 26 of the former and 31 of the latter making their debuts during the year. Boeing 787s are still suffering from problems with their Rolls Royce engines, with Norwegian permanently having a number sitting around at Gatwick, Birmingham and Oslo, necessitating the lease of various aircraft including the HiFly Malta A380 and a pair of Wamos Air A330s that have been operating services on their behalf in recent months, and Virgin Atlantic having to lease a quartet of former Air Berlin A330s, two of which are Gatwick based. Indeed, even the NEOs and MAXs have had well-publicised engine issues resulting in many delivery delays. My attempts to "kill off" the A310 twelve months ago were ill founded as the type continues to provide sterling service with Air Transat, but for how much longer?

AIRLINE GAINS & LOSSES

We gained four scheduled airlines during the year with Rossiya returning in March to replace Aeroflot, Qatar Airways beginning its Doha flights in May, Level appearing in July and the very welcome advent of China Eastern in December with their Shanghai-Pudong service. However, we lost Med-View when the airline suspended the route, Tianjin Airlines when LHR stole it from us, CobaltAir who went out of business and, as previously mentioned, Aeroflot. There are more to go in 2019 as well, with Air China & FlyBe moving to LHR and Wow Air to Stansted, though on a positive note, Qatar Airways & Wizz Air have both announced increases in their services. This against a backdrop of what has been a very bad year for European airlines with a number of bankruptcies. The only ones directly affecting Gatwick were those of CobaltAir & the Small Planet Airlines group, though others included Cello Air, Primera Air Nordic & its Scandinavian sister, Privatair, Skyworks and VLM, while with FlyBe having put itself up for sale, another name could disappear from the skies this year. I do not expect to see much change among the aircraft types that our scheduled carriers will operate to Gatwick in 2019, though I would hope to see some TUI Airways B38Ms here and WestJet will doubtless breath a sigh of relief as their brand new B789s take over from those tired old B763s.

Airlines operating seasonal winter services included Austrian Airlines, Finnair, Niki and Swiss, with summer only flights flown by the likes of Air Italy, Azores Airlines, Croatia Airlines, FreeBird and Pegasus. To my surprise, Rouge failed to return in 2018, while Smartlynx, who leased a number of Airbuses to Thomas Cook again, failed to base any of them at Gatwick last year.

AIRLINES AT GATWICK AT YEAR END

Scheduled carriers as at 31/12/18 were:

Aegean (seasonal), Aer Lingus, Air Arabia Maroc, Air Baltic, Air China, Air Europa, Air Malta, Air Transat, AtlasGlobal (for IAW), Aurigny
Belavia, British Airways
Cathay Pacific, China Airlines, China Eastern
easyJet, easyJet Europe, easyJet Switzerland, Emirates, Enter Air
Finnair (seasonal), Flybe
Georgian Airways
Iberia Express, Icelandair, Iraqi Airways
Level
Norwegian Air International, Norwegian Air Shuttle, Norwegian Air UK, Norwegian Long Haul
Qatar Airways
RAM, Rossiya, RwandAir, Ryanair
SmartWings, Swiss International (seasonal)
TAP, TAP Express, Thomas Cook, THY, Titan Airways, Travel Service, TUI Airways, Tunisair
Ukraine International
Virgin Atlantic, Vueling
WestJet, Wizz Air, Wow Air

Other carriers seen at Gatwick in 2018 included:

Aeroflot, Aero4M, Aigle Azur, Air Explore, Air Nostrum, Alba Star, Austrian Airlines, Avion Express
BA Cityflyer, BH Air, Blue Air, Blue Islands bmi Regional
Cello Aviation, CobaltAir, Condor, Croatia Airlines, CSA, Cubana
Danish Air Transport
Eastern Airways, Enter Air, Estelar, Euro Atlantic Airways
FlyBondi
GainJet, Germania, Germania Flug, GetJet Airlines, Go2Sky
HiFly, HiFly Malta
Jet2
Korean Air
Luxair
Maleth-Aero, Med-View, Montenegro Airlines
Neos
Olympus Airways
PrivatAir Deutschland, Privilege Style
Small Planet Airlines Germany, Small Planet Airlines Polska, SmartLynx, SmartLynx Estonia, Sun-Air, Sundair, Sunwing Airlines, Swift Air
Thomas Cook Belgium, Thomas Cook Balearics, Travel Service Polska
VIA Airways, VLM Airlines, Voyageur Airways
Wamos Air
Xtra Airways

The number of other carriers continues to drop year-on-year, with only 61 last year, just over half of the 2013 total of 118 and 3 down on 2017..

NEW AIRLINERS

143 easyJet (including 4 Swiss and 107 Austrian)
50 Ryanair
31 Aeroflot
30 Qatar Airways
29 Norwegian
19 Emirates
18 Rossiya
16 Finnair
11 Air China, China Airlines
10 SmartWings, THY, Vueling

Thirteen airlines made it into double figures with first visits during 2018, compared with a mere 8 in 2017

Airliner first visits by manufacturer were:

Airbus (including CSeries)

A20N. Sixteen easyJet, plus single examples from Air Malta and TAP
A21N. Four TAP, three easyJet and one from WOW Air
A221. Three Swiss
A223. Seven Air Baltic and five Swiss
A319. Thirty-five easyJet Europe, seventeen Rossiya, two Finnair and single examples from Aigle Azur, CobaltAir and the Bulgarian Government
A320. Eighty-nine easyJet (including seventy-one Austrian and four Swiss), ten Vueling, six Finnair, two Austrian Airlines and one from each of Aigle Azur, Air Arabia Maroc, Air Malta, Rossiya, Small Planet Airlines Germany, Smartlynx Estonia, Sundair, Thomas Cook Balearics, VIA Airways, VLM and Wizz Air
A321. Eight Finnair, six Thomas Cook, four from Level and Wizz Air, two from Titan Airways and Wow Air, and one each from CSA, Olympus Airways, Smartlynx, Thomas Cook Scandinavia and TAP
A330. A slight increase on the previous year, with eleven Air China, ten THY, eight China Eastern, four Virgin Atlantic, three Air Transat and one each from Condor, Level and Tunisair
A340. Just a single example from HiFly Malta compared to three newcomers in 2017
A350. A drop in numbers with ten from China Airlines and one from Cathay Pacific
A380. Double the 2017 figure to nineteen Emirates and the HiFly Malta machine

Antonov

It was good to see an An-124 make its first visit during the year (the last one was in 1999). This was a Volga-Dnepr machine, which collected a pair of Angolan-registered Pumas that had been roaded in and transported them to Ft Worth Alliance, TX

ATR

A drop in numbers from three the previous year to a lone Blue Islands ATR72 operating a football charter

BAe

Down from five newcomers in 2017 to just one RJ100 from the now defunct Cello Aviation

Boeing

B738M. A big jump this year with thirteen Norwegian, nine WestJet, six SmartWings and three Icelandair
B737 Classic. Just five during last year compared to nine the previous year as more and more older B737NGs become available. A pair of B733s with one each from Maleth-Aero and T2 Aviation, a couple of 734s with one from GetJet and another from Titan Airways along with a single B735 from Air X Charter
B737NG. Three B737s during the year, with two from the now defunct Privatair Deutschland and a Saudi BBJ. A host of B738s comprising fifty Ryanair, thirty-one Aeroflot, four each from Jet2, SmartWings, and Ukraine International, three from Air Europa and Enter Air, a pair from Norwegian plus single examples from Air Italy, AlbaStar, Belavia, Blue Air, Sunwing Airlines, Swift Air, TUIfly Nordic and Xtra Airways
B747. No sign of any new jumbos during the year
B757. Down from five in 2017 to a single Icelandair B752 in 2018
B767. Another big drop from nine to just one Ukraine International B763
B777. Yet another type where numbers were down. This time it was from a 2017 total of nine to single examples of the B772 from Crystal Luxury Air and Ukraine International and one B773 each from British Airways and Korean Air
B787. A major increase over 2017, mainly due to the appearance of all thirty of the B788s in the Qatar Airways fleet. The others consisted of thirteen Norwegian (ten of which were delivered direct to Gatwick), two each from Air Europa and TUI Airways and a single British Airways machine

Bombardier

With the CSeries now being reported under Airbus, there were just seven aircraft to tell you about and these were a pair of Proair Aviation CRJ2s, a Maltese CRJ8 and single DHC8s from FlyBe, Luxair and Voyageur Airways

Embraer

No EMB135BJs this year, just one EMB145 from each of Aero4M, BMi Regional and Eastern Airways, one EMB175 from Belavia, four EMB190s comprising two from BA Cityflyer and one each from Georgian Airways and Helvetic Airways and a pair of EMB195s from Belavia along with a lone TAP Express aircraft

McDonnell-Douglas

Featured again last year, having failed to appear in 2017, with an ALK Airlines subbing for BH Air. Will we ever see another one make its first visit here?

Saab

Another manufacturer appearing here again with a single Eastern Airways Saab 2000

Manufacturers returning in 2018 were Antonov, McDonnell-Douglas and SAAB, while those that appeared in 2017 but not in 2018, were Dornier, Ilyushin and Sukhoi.

In my last review, I was bemoaning the fact that less than 10% of our airliner newcomers were from companies other Airbus or Boeing. This time that figure had dropped to just over 4%. Even if you add back the CSeries aircraft, which I now count under Airbus, that figure would still be just under 7%.

GENERAL AVIATION

As mentioned earlier, we only saw two new types here in 2018, namely the AW169 and the EMB545. We suffered yet another drop in GA visitors, with only the total number of helicopter visitors showing an increase from eight to eleven, but that was only because three police helicopters made their debuts during the December drone incident.

FIRST VISITS BY YEAR

2000 - 624 (364 liners, 199 biz, 27 twins, 31 helos, 3 others)
2001 - 532 (327 liners, 155 biz, 21 twins, 24 helos, 5 others)
2002 - 637 (414 liners, 168 biz, 22 twins, 26 helos, 7 others)
2003 - 598 (408 liners, 139 biz, 20 twins, 23 helos, 8 others)
2004 - 663 (474 liners, 144 biz, 18 twins, 18 helos, 9 others)
2005 - 690 (466 liners, 174 biz, 20 twins, 22 helos, 8 others)
2006 - 769 (516 liners, 209 biz, 21 twins, 19 helos, 4 others)
2007 - 702 (452 liners, 209 biz, 14 twins, 21 helos, 6 others)
2008 - 630 (379 liners, 219 biz, 16 twins, 13 helos, 3 others)
2009 - 606 (382 liners, 186 biz, 16 twins, 12 helos, 10 others)
2010 - 555 (350 liners, 172 biz, 21 twins, 5 helos, 7 others)
2011 - 613 (427 liners, 170 biz, 9 twins, 4 helos, 3 others)
2012 - 689 (496 liners, 168 biz, 10 twins, 10 helos, 5 others)
2013 - 608 (411 liners, 168 biz, 12 twins, 15 helos, 2 others)
2014 - 511 (351 liners, 133 biz, 7 twins, 16 helos, 4 others)
2015 - 565 (413 liners, 127 biz, 7 twins, 11 helos, 7 others)
2016 - 569 (449 liners, 103 biz, 5 twins, 10 helos, 2 others)
2017 - 532 (429 liners, 86 biz, 3 twins, 8 helos, 6 others)
2018 - 645 (547 liners, 80 biz, 3 twins, 11 helos, 4 others)

A big increase over 2017, but chiefly accounted for by easyJet's policy of moving aircraft onto the Austrian register. The biz jet total continues to fall each year. Diversions only accounted for 9 of the newcomers in 2018, compared to 25 in the year before. Of the total number of newcomers, 479 were new airframes for the airport, while 166 had previously been to see us in some other guise.

Airliner breakdown
234 A320 (18 A20N, 8 A21N, 57 A319, 119 A320, 32 A321)
148 B737 (31 B38M, 2 B733, 2 B734, 1 B735, 3 B737, 109 B738)
49 B787
39 A330
20 A380
15 A220 (CSeries)
12 A350
7 E190
4 B777
3 CRJ2, DHC8, EMB145
1 A340, An124, ATR72, B757, B767, CRJ8, E175, MD80, RJ100, S2000

Types that appeared in 2017, but failed to feature in 2018 were the A400, ATR42, B747, C17, D328JET, E135, Il76 and Su95

Biz Jet breakdown
12 BD700
10 Gulf 4
7 Learjet
5 Ce525, Ce560, Ce680, DA7X
4 CL600, Gulf5
3 BD100, Be400, Ce510, DA900, Gulf 650
2 Phenom
1 Ce650, Ce750, EMB545, DA2000, Gulf 3, Westwind

Types missing from the 2017 list were the Ce500, G200, G280, EMB550 and HA4000. The BD700 ousted the Challenger from its first place spot

Biz prop/twin breakdown
4 PC-12
1 Be200, Ce421, TBM700

The same number as in 2017

Helicopter breakdown (overflights are NOT recorded/included by me)
3 A109, Puma
2 EC135
1 AW169, EC145, EC155

Up from 9 in 2017. The three Pumas were airfreight, with two arriving by road, while the third was dragged out of its aircraft onto the tarmac to make a brief appearance on the ramp.

By country prefix (including military)
119 OE
89 G
64 EI
45 VP-B/VQ-B
32 B
30 A7
28 N
19 A6, EC
18 D
17 C, HB
16 OH
13 9H
12 TC
11 CS
10 OK
9 LN
7 F, TF, YL
6 HA, UR
5 M
4 EW, SP
3 LY, LZ, OY
2 CN, D2, HZ, LX
1 ES, HL, OO, P4, RA, SE, SX, S5, TS, VT, YR, 4L, 5B

46 countries, down four on 2017. Had it not been for the mass move of easyJet aircraft to the Austrian register, Ireland and the UK would have retained the two top spots

By manufacturer (2017 figures in brackets):
321 Airbus (227)
203 Boeing (160)
33 Bombardier (42, CSeries included under Airbus)
21 Cessna (23)
18 Gulfstream (16)
13 Embraer (21)
9 Dassault (8)
4 Hawker-Beechcraft (4)
Plus 23 from assorted other manufacturers (30)

Total first visits in 2018 by month
Jan 77 (62 liners, 14 biz, 1 others)
Feb 62 (55 liners, 7 biz, 0 others)
Mar 82 (70 liners, 7 biz, 5 others)
Apr 57 (54 liners, 2 biz, 1 others)
May 73 (64 liners, 8 biz, 1 others)
Jun 60 (56 liners, 4 biz, 1 others)
Jly 54 (45 liners, 7 biz, 2 others)
Aug 28 (26 liners, 2 biz, 0 others)
Sep 23 (21 liners, 2 biz, 0 others)
Oct 34 (24 liners, 9 biz, 1 others)
Nov 46 (34 liners, 11 biz, 1 others)
Dec 49 (37 liners, 6 biz, 6 others)

Military & government newcomers

The 2017 total was very low (9), but 2018 took the biscuit with just two.
LZ-AOB A319 Government of Bulgaria
147/XS TBM700A French Air Force

AND FINALLY

Thanks to the many who have contributed to the roundup and the Gatwick mailing list during the past 12 months, and in particular to Mr Anon without whose due lists and snippets of information my job would be much harder. Also, thanks to Dave Long for feeding us with a virtually non-stop stream of excellent photos of the more interesting newcomers in 2018. Here's hoping we are in for an interesting aviation year ahead, though I am sure that my annual prayer for more variety will continue to remain unheeded.

John (& Mad Max)