7 reviews
Having formed in 1968, Aurigny Air Service is the second oldest UK Airline, behind the 1962 Scottish Loganair, Aurigny Air Service has provided an essential air service from its home on the Island of Guernsey, one of the Channel Islands.
Given its main business is connecting Guernsey to other Channel Islands (Jersey & Alderney) as well as major UK cities including London (Gatwick, Stansted & City), Manchester, Southampton, Bristol, etc. The airline has focuses on small turboprop aircraft for its fleet, but something big happened in the early 2010s which would change things for the airline.
For years Flybe had a decent domestic base at London Gatwick and in 2013 they sold their slots at London Gatwick to easyJet. The airline pulled out of London Gatwick, except a sole Newquay service which was retained as a "PSO". This lead to Aurigny wanting to expand their main service into London.
The airline opted to acquire a single Embraer ERJ-195 for use on the Guernsey to London Gatwick service, and as it was the aircraft arrived in early 2014 and was fittingly registered as G-NSEY, it became the new flagship of the fleet as well as bringing Aurigny into the jet age.
For the last ten years the aircraft has been a very popular means of getting to London from the Channel Island with locals and regular flyers, however having a small fleet of planes with one aircraft making up an entire fleet of jets, as the 2020's came and saw a pandemic disrupt the travel and tourism industry, the now near decade old aircraft was starting to show the problems of the airline's arrangement.
Given the majority of the Aurigny fleet is focused on the ATR 72 family as well as a small fleet of Dornier D-228s operating within the Channel Islands, the airline announced in late 2023 that they would withdraw and sell their sole Embraer ERJ-195 in favour of introducing two more ATR 72-600 to expand their fleet and network going forward.
G-NSEY is due to be withdrawn by the end of April 2024, whether the plane is retained in service further if there is issues selling the "high cycle" jet, which spent 90% of its life flying 45 minute services between London Gatwick & Guernsey, it is surly going to be the end of an era.
A golden opportunity came to fly the Aurigny ERJ-195 came up in December 2023, so I booked to fly on February 29th 2024. However the day before I was due to fly the flights I was on were cancelled due to unprecedented bad weather over the end of February 2024, Aurigny got a call from me and they offered to move my day trip to another day, I opted to try my luck on March 5th 2024 and the trip was rescheduled for free by the airline (now that's how you do customer service) and this is how that flight went!
Grabbing the National Express NX205 coach service at Bournemouth was my best way of getting over to London Gatwick for the morning, its usually good value and better than relying on a car & airport car park, and I can rest and relax for the day ahead. I went to the South Terminal where Aurigny Air Service fly from using both the Embraer ERJ-195 & the ATR 72-600 alternatively.
Whilst I had done online check in, I went to the Aurigny desk to grab boarding passes for the return flights that day, it was a peace of mind move I usually try to do as sometimes technology does not work as intended.
A little travel hack for people flying out of London Gatwick's South Terminal, if you buy Priority Security at the Podium before you enter security (its £8 alone) you can also combine with Lounge Access to the No.1 Lounge starting at £28 for 2 hours access + Priority Security. I think the Airport offers a similar service from the North Terminal, but I've yet to try that out.
I paid £42 for Priority Security and Four hours of Lounge access- which was a great deal in my opinion, if you take £8 off from the Priority Security, the lounge only set me back £34 for four hours, which would be a similar cost if I was to get breakfast with some drinks in a restaurant or bar airside, just make sure you make the most of the lounge facilities when you get inside it.
Breakfast with a clear view of aircraft for several hours before my flight, yes please!
The location of the No.1 Lounge does allow for some great movements of aircraft taxiing to and from the runway at LGW as well as a great view of parked planes on one of the piers. Departures & Arrivals are possible with a decent camera and lens. It should be worth noting that the No.1 Lounge can get quite busy at times.
I was in the lounge long enough, that I opted to go back and enjoy a quick serving of pancakes from the No.1 Lounge's pancake machine, this type of thing isn't too common in the UK, but No.1 Lounge I know offers this at various Airport lounges across the UK. I love seeing the pancake get made and cooked in the machine, its a guilty fascination of mine.
Considering how badly London Gatwick was hit by the pandemic and airline's flocking to London Heathrow, it was amazing to see the airport bouncing back with a lot of colour and diversity on the departure screens!
As mid morning came and my stomach certainly well lined up from breakfast, I extended to having a single alcoholic beverage to make up some of the expense on visiting this lounge. I opted for a cognac whilst observing my Aurigny Air Service flight arrival on the inbound service from Guernsey, but once I had finished and snapped a few pictures of the Embraer taxing, it was off to Gate 3 to find the aircraft.
After a brisk walk to Gate 3 from the No.1 Lounge, I found the airline's sole jet airliner was awaiting me and all but three passengers had boarded already, I thought I was running late but it turns out they had simply been quite efficient turning this aircraft around as there wasn't a full load on this flight. So I scanned my boarding pass and made my way to the parked up Embraer ERJ-195.
Aurigny Air Service's only Embraer ERJ-195 is registered as G-NSEY, and is configured in an all economy class layout of 122 seats. The forward seven rows are sold as Premium seats with slightly extra legroom. The aircraft was ordered in 2013 and was delivered brand new from Embraer in June 2014. Whilst the aircraft has mainly plied its trade on the Guernsey to London Gatwick route, it has been seen during its ten years of flying at Manchester, Budapest, Porto, Southampton, Birmingham, Palma de Mallorca and Barcelona. Most of the routes its done into Continental Europe have likely been holiday charter flights. It has been seen at Exeter and Norwich for maintenance as well.
I was originally booked into Seat 9A, but someone was occupying Seat 9B, instead of moving that passenger, the flight attendant said if I wanted to, I could take up another window seat on the half empty/half full flight, so I opted to move over into Seat 8F. I was pleased as it meant I got a row to myself (two abreast on the ERJ).
We pushed back for a slightly earlier departure to our slot time as we'd fully boarded the aircraft early. It was only a short taxi from Gate 3 at the South Terminal over to the departure runway that day which was Runway 26L. After a short hold for an arriving Saudi Boeing 787 Dreamliner, it was our turn to depart and the ERJ-195 rocketed out of London Gatwick effortlessly and straight into the dull and low cloud cover surrounding Crawley that day!
We broke through the cloud cover eventually and began the short flight south across the English Channel towards the Channel Islands.
Our departure route took us straight out of London Gatwick and across Sussex and into Hampshire before making a turn south of Winchester. We flew over Southampton before turning South for a direct crossing of the English Channel between Bournemouth and Lymington. Not that I could get a good view of my home area due to the thick cloud cover over the South of England.
During the flight I took some time to read the Aurigny inflight magazine which contained various tour guide articles on their destinations, news about the airline as well as a spread on their current fleet & route map. There was a Duty Free shop page as well a page dedicated to the inflight café service they were providing.
Given how short most of their flights are I'm surprised they offered a "buy on board" service and not just provided a similar set up to Loganair offering complimentary basics like Water, Tea or Coffee with a sweet or savoury snack. Each airline to their own devices I guess?
The flight attendants did the café service and I opted for the "Deal 4" option for £4.85p which contains a Hot Drink + Sweet Snack. Ample snack service for such a short UK domestic flight.
Just as things were getting started, it was time to begin our decent into Guernsey. The entire flight time of this flight from take off to landing according to Flight Radar 24 was: 35 minutes from 11:50am to 12:20pm.
We began our arrival passing the Channel Island of Alderney, we then proceeded to turn onto finals over the Channel Island of Sark, the smallest of the Islands, we then had a straight run into Guernsey Airport from there, I was able to see the Island's capital of Saint Peter Port from the right side of the plane as we came in for arrival into Guernsey Airport on Runway 27.
After arriving into a sunny Guernsey Airport, we taxied off the runway and made a quick taxi over to the main Terminal building, the apron was filled with other ATR 72 from Blue Island and Aurigny as well as one of the airline's Dornier D-228. Just off the Terminal was the general aviation area where dozens of small private aircraft were parked up.
Once most of the other passengers had vacated the plane, I grabbed a few final cabin shots of the Aurigny ERJ-195, knowing I would unfortunately not likely be flying on this aircraft again. It was a short and sweet experience, but a great opportunity to try a truly one-off UK airline experience that won't be repeated in the coming months.
Departing aircraft at Guernsey is an open process, which was a great chance to snap some final shots of my flight on the walk to the domestic arrivals. If you are ever on a trip to the UK for aviation related breaks, try get a trip on Aurigny, its definitely something I'd recommend if you want to try a unique airline that is not easily seen outside the UK.
Great regional product from Aurigny Air Service, it was nice to tick off a new and obscure airline that had been on my travel list for years, I was really impressed with the way my cancellation was handled the previous week.
London Gatwick is one of my favourite airports to fly from and their Security/Lounge package you can pay on arrival is a good upsell if you are arriving ahead of your flight by a long period of time,
6 Comments
That is showing how important this flight was for you. That was the same sensation that I felt for my last flight on CRJ before the airplane left Hop's fleet.
Despite being comfy, seats seems to be quite thin.
Weather conditions are really good in Guernesey actually.
Thanks for relating your experience and your passion !
Thanks for sharing!
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