Gloucestershire airport boosts business with runway

To attract more business aviation Gloucestershire airport has extended its runway, said the airport’s head of operations, Darren Lewington,”Although only 12m of additional tarmac has been laid, the removal of obstacles nearby and the creation of an overrun means the landing distances available for aircraft have increased by up to 150m,” he added “The extra runway distances make a huge difference to the operators of the larger aircraft that currently use the airport and will generate additional business for us,”

Mr Lewington also said, “Business aviation movements make up around 5% of the take-off and landings, but they generate 30% of our revenue.” A large volume of activity is from general aviation aircraft, with approximately 70,000 actions annually. “With the closure of Filton airport, near Bristol, at the end of the year, there is already additional demand from corporate aircraft flying to the southwest of England. We are ideally placed to serve high net worth individuals in this region, as well as the Birmingham and Oxford catchment,” he adds.

Business aviation remains significant for airports across the country but increasingly as costs rise for operators they are looking for new, cost effective ways of running their businesses. Flight operations can be a significant outlay, and whilst operators cannot compromise on safety there are now solutions to make improve efficiency of all aspects of operations. ARINC Direct for example offer complete solutions for business aviation including all aircraft communications, flight support and planning services and even ancillary services such as aircraft broadband. For further information please visit the ARINC Direct website.