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Bradda.com is a photographic website featuring ship and aircraft photos as well as photographs taken around the Isle of Man and other subjects of interest to the webmaster. The photographs are grouped into Albums,
and there are various sub-sections within the Albums.
The site has 3708 photographs which have been viewed a total of 431052 times.
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Sun, May 11, 2008 The Observer's Book of Ships
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 This weekend I picked up a copy of 'The Observer's Book of Ship' - the 1973 edition, which is the edition I had as a boy. Most pleasing. I have no idea what happened to my original copy.
What was, however, a little sad, was flicking through it and realising that most of the British shipping companies mentioned in the book no longer existed: Silver Line, Anchor Line, Booth Line, Buries Markes, Harrison Line, Clan Line, Prince Line, Strick Line, Glen Line, Reardon Smith..... The list goes on.
It also reminded me of how much things have changed in the thirty odd years since the book was published.
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Sun, May 11, 2008 EuroManx Slide Show
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In honour of EuroManx, I've knocked together a quick slide show:
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Sat, May 10, 2008 Why did EuroManx fail?
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There has been much shouting and general upset since the news that EuroManx failed yesterday. There is some good news in that other airlines (FlyBe and Manx2) are honouring (where possible) EuroManx bookings.
There has also been a lot of nonsense spoken. Suggestions that EuroManx should have been bailed out by the Government or that an airline should be granted a monopoly of certain routes. All piffle, of course. The Steam Packet has an effective monopoly on ferry services, and we all know how well that's worked out.
The sad fact is that a small airline failed. It's not the end of the world. Other airlines have, and will continue to step into the gap left by EuroManx.
For me, the following post on Manx Forums sums things up nicely:
Euromanx didnt go pop becasue the islands economy is on a down turn or the lack of bums on seats due to our population or the increased pressure from flybe.
They went to the wall because in 2004, 05 & 06*:- They flew to stansted with empty planes
- They had 2 jets, and 4 turbo prop planes 2 of one manufacture and 2 of another these had huge costs assosiated with them including nearly 150 staff
- They had a reservations system that suited a MUCH bigger airline
- They bought london city route and southhampton routes off flybe and then ran them badly or dropped them in the case of southhampton
- They bought the liverpool route off emerald and had to have them operate it for them
- They swapped the Manchester route for Dublin with Aer arann and they had to again buy liverpool route off aer arann including have aer arann operate the route for them
- They failed to expand when opportunities presented themselves (Luton for example)
- They let manx2 get a foothold on belfast without any fight at all
- In Oct 07 they sold the only assets the company had (2 dash 8 planes) and leased the planes back again from a finance company, they used these funds to pay back pressing debt and line the shareholders empty-ish pockets.
* may contain some errors and omissions
the list goes on and on and once the bank funding dried up and the shareholders lost interest they couldnt afford to have the maintenance carried out on the planes, today the whole thing ended in a rather unpleasant manner.
to run an airline you need to have more than one string to your bow you need to maintain other peoples planes, or buy your planes cheaply and sell them on at a profit, or run a charter operation that gives guarenteed profit flights or run a lease in operation that provides cover for other tech aircraft or do cargo...... euromanx did none of these things or tried poorly to do some of them.
All of these problems stem from a piss poor management team at board level littered with consultants and "experts" who had no place running a airline in a market they knew nothing of and care little for.
I would add that whilst the cost of fuel probably did push them over the edge, this was merely the straw that broke the camel's back and not the primary cause of the failure.
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Fri, May 09, 2008 EuroManx Cease Operations
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EuroManx issued the following press release this morning:
It is with great regret that EuroManx have announced today that the company is ceasing operations forthwith with no further flights being operated.
All passengers with tickets for EuroManx services can be assured that alternative arrangements are being sourced.
Accordingly Flybe will carry all ticketed EuroManx passengers to Liverpool, Manchester and also initially to either London Luton or London Gatwick on services where Flybe have space available to accommodate the passenger.
EuroManx passengers to Belfast will be advised in due course.
For the past 5 years EuroManx has focused on providing a locally based operation offering high quality schedules and services dedicated to the Isle of Man.
During this time the employees have worked hard to develop and grow the business but over the last 6 months a number of factors including rising fuel prices and reduced passenger numbers have proved to be insurmountable obstacles to the airline being able to continue to operate.
End
Passing the airport on my way into work this morning there was no sign of any EuroManx aircraft. Presumably they have already been returned to their owners.
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Thu, May 08, 2008 EuroManx maintenance trouble
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EuroManx flights were delayed or canceled earlier this week when one of their leased aircraft was grounded for maintenance.
iomtoday has the full story.
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