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Flights from Manchester to Dubai and Palma
Dear Sir,
The article in the MDB of 21 November “A sign of the Times?” is statistically accurate, but does not give the whole picture regarding the number of passengers using the Manchester area for travel to Dubai and Majorca.
 The article concludes that Dubai has overtaken Palma as the top destination from Manchester. There are a number of other factors to be considered as Frank Leavers, in his ‘Confidential’ column on Wednesday, 26 November, indicates when he makes reference to the other regional airports.
Dubai is served daily throughout the year from 4 UK airports, London, Birmingham, Manchester, Newcastle and Glasgow. It is therefore reasonable to assume that travellers, living south of a line half way between Manchester and Newcastle or living north of a line half way to Birmingham, would use Manchester airport.
This Manchester catchment area includes 4 additional airports, Blackpool (sadly no longer open), Liverpool, Leeds-Bradford and Doncaster-Sheffield.
There are 3 return flights per day from Manchester to Dubai, all using large Boeing 777 or Airbus A380 aircraft and offering 2,500 seats per day to and from this area. Given an 87% load factor over the 9 months of the survey equates to the 596,000 passengers quoted in the MDB article.
However, all the passengers flying to or from Dubai do not stay in Dubai, some transit the airport on their way to or from destinations such as Australia, New Zealand and South East Asia. In 2004 it was estimated that transit passengers accounted for 30% of this total, but allowing for the increasing popularity of Dubai as a holiday destination, this figure can be reduced to 20%.
The final figure of passengers travelling to and from Dubai as a final destination, and ignoring transit passengers, now becomes 477,000.
During the first 3 months of this period, January to March, there were just 91 flights offering 31,000 seats from this Manchester catchment area. Using a similar 87% load factor relates to 27,000 passengers flying either to or from this area. The 6 months of summer operation, April to September, sees a much changed situation.
During this period a total of 6,400 flights were operated to Palma, from the 5 airports, with an average of 170 seats per flight (smaller Boeing 737 or Airbus A320 aircraft). Allowing for a similar load factor of 87%, the number of passengers now becomes 940,000. Add this to the 27,000 passengers carried in the winter period and the total for the 9 months becomes an impressive 967,000. More than double that for Dubai.
No doubt Dubai will continue to attract those who want sun, sea and sand plus some glitter in the winter time, but Majorca has much to offer, if only it were made available and packaged correctly. That, of course, is the never ending story.