What's the point of US-Europe flights stopping in Shannon any more?

Where’s the data showing that they do? I’ve only been on direct flights to European cities – unless I’m going to Ireland.

Maybe because US customs have a pre clearance faculty there meaning you can clear US customs and immigration on the stopover and speed things up when you get to the other end.

Random fact – during the Cold War both the US and the soviet airforce used Shannon as refuelling stopover. I imagine that was fun

less fuel on board = less mass = less fuel consumption = money saved.

What @ragingloli said is a good point. It applies not just to being closer to North America, but requiring less wrong-direction travel inside European airspace.

Also, once an international airport is built, it’s liable to be useful because of its capacity, location (for the fuel reason, and also for storm avoidance), and perhaps its extra market for rent and fees. Also, filling airplanes with as many passengers per flight is a major consideration for efficiency, which is one major reason why airlines incentivize taking stopovers, and having more airport options is useful for that.

It’s also not just an abstract best-case individual calculation. An airline presence in an airport has its own cause & effect factors.

@ragingloli I think a disproportionate amount of fuel is burned in takeoff, not to mention time=money in the airline business. Adding an extra landing (with another opportunity for delays) would probably not be very cost-effective.

I’m not saying you’re wrong (I don’t know the numbers), but I think there may be another explanation.

Nobody I know has ever had to stop in Shannon. I have no idea where this is coming from. Certain airlines use certain cities as hubs. Is this in regards to a particular airline?

To have a real Irish Coffee at the place in the Airport in which the drink was invented.

Do they? I’ve never stopped in Shannon going from the US to other parts of Europe. Doesn’t it matter what airline you’re flying? I don’t know if Europe allows airlines to fly from country to country when neither is the home base country? America doesn’t as far as I know.

Take BA 3 or BA 1 – London – - Shannon – NYC

Both stop in Shannon going west, nonstop back to London.

Maybe BA needs to put more fuel on those small planes.

My assumption would be that they are profiting then by taking passengers to Ireland and picking some up from there to take to NYC. But there are many, many airlines that fly non-stop.

Maybe BA does, but from the US to Europe usually you go straight into the European country the European airline is based. Lufthansa is US to Germany, Al Italian US to Italy, etc. If you fly an American airline it would be US to a particular country, but as far as I know the US airline can’t fly country to country within Europe. So, for instance if Delta flies to Shannon, it can’t go Shannon to another part of Europe. Unless that has changed? Or, maybe I misunderstood it when I learned it.

BA going NYC-Shannon-London I guess BA is obviously allowed to do it, and it must be profitable for them I guess. I’m assuming BA also has nonstop London-NYC, but I don’t know for sure. If they do that would be the first choice for people flying from London to NYC and vice versa.

Since the advent of more fuel efficient aircraft, the end of the Cold War and the locals’ popular resistance against the airport being used for various US military adventures such as rendition flight stopovers, the airport has been struggling economically. According to Wikipedia it is being artificially kept alive through political tit for tats with the EU, Canada and the States. It represents 250 jobs in the area and is also one of the alternative landing strips for the Space Shuttle.

Perhaps BA has some of their catering done there and they load on the food carts when they stop? Not sure.

BA3 and BA1 both stop at Shannon specifically to take advantage of the US customs there. They are business class only and the plane is a dinky little 30 seater flying from London City Airport (right on the Thames, very easy to get to from the city and basically in the docklands) The extra time (20 minutes) you spend at Shannon clearing customs is more than made up for by not having to go any where near Heathrow and avoiding customs at JFK (which I’m guessing is significantly busier than their out post in the middle of no where in Ireland).

^^That sounds like a good reason.

Ah. We have flights like that that go direct from Stavanger to Houston. Oil people with money to burn it no time to waste.

So… To add more info to my earlier response regarding BA1 and BA3. The runway at London city airport is pretty short (it’s also built on a man made island in a river) meaning the Airbus A318’s that BA use for these two flights can’t be fully fuelled or they won’t be able to take off in the space available. On top of this the A318 doesn’t have the range, even fully fuelled to fly west bound from London to JFK although on the eastbound return leg it does (I’m guessing it gets a helping hand in the way back from the jet stream).

The US customs thing is a bonus.