Richmond International Airport

[I miss RVA]

7 hours ago, plain said:

1.) It will continue to grow

2.) the terminal is absolutely beautiful.

3.) Let's get the international flights going and keep it pushing.

1.) From your keyboard to God's eyes, my friend!

2.) Yes it is! (I'm only going on photos - but wow - it's a sweet looking terminal).

3.)   !!!  AMEN, brother!!! 

[eandslee]

The airport (RIC) statistics were just released for June and despite the weather and system issues cancelling a lot of flights in June, the airport did remarkably well!

Check out those cargo stats!  Off the charts!  Of course, the passenger stats aren’t bad either. By comparison, ORF’s passenger total for June was 431,637.  ORF beat us in June, but we’ll be back. The system issues really hurt RIC more than ORF.  Just think what our totals would look like if everything had run smoothly in June!  
 

 

Edited July 26, 2023 by eandslee

[I miss RVA]

9 minutes ago, eandslee said:

The airport (RIC) statistics were just released and despite the weather and system issues cancelling a lot of flights in June, the airport did remarkably well!

Check out those cargo stats!  Off the charts!  Of course, the passenger stats aren’t bad either. By comparison, ORF’s passenger total for June was 431,637.  ORF beat us in June, but we’ll be back. The system issues really hurt RIC more than ORF.  Just think what our totals would look like if everything had run smoothly in June!  
 

 

Only a roughly 1,500-passenger difference in June - and yeah, if the system trouble and weather doesn't intervene, we likely would have broken May's record.

Even with that - using only the % change year-over-year compared with 2022 - we're STILL on pace (if we maintain the 19.35% increase) to hit 5 million for full year 2023 (5,012,000). This includes slower months and dips in service - it's a straight calculation using the year-over-year YTD cumulative % change. If we stay on this current pace, we'll hit 5 million.

[plain]

What's up with the mail?

[I miss RVA]

26 minutes ago, plain said:

What's up with the mail?

I was wondering that myself - maybe a reporting error?

[eandslee]

5 minutes ago, I miss RVA said:

I was wondering that myself - maybe a reporting error?

Not a reporting error - it’s been in a deep decline for a while now.  I guess mail in the Richmond area is becoming less and less air mail!

[Merrittk92]

I’m booked out of RIC in October for a vacation in British Columbia. Doin’ my part BABY!! 

[eandslee]

50 minutes ago, Merrittk92 said:

I’m booked out of RIC in October for a vacation in British Columbia. Doin’ my part BABY!! 

Thank you!!  Awesome…and tell all your friends to do the same! 

Edited July 26, 2023 by eandslee

[I miss RVA]

2 hours ago, eandslee said:

Not a reporting error - it’s been in a deep decline for a while now.  I guess mail in the Richmond area is becoming less and less air mail!

Do we have any understanding as to what this is?

[eandslee]

7 hours ago, I miss RVA said:

Do we have any understanding as to what this is?

Honestly, I have no idea, but I’ll ask and see what I can find out. 

[I miss RVA]

5 hours ago, eandslee said:

Honestly, I have no idea, but I’ll ask and see what I can find out. 

Thanks, my friend. I'll be interested to know the story behind this.

[eandslee]

About the $5.5M grant to offset taxiway E at RIC. This article explains everything:

https://www.henricocitizen.com/articles/richmond-international-airport-receives-5-5m-in-federal-funding-for-runway-enhancement/

[I miss RVA]

32 minutes ago, eandslee said:

About the $5.5M grant to offset taxiway E at RIC. This article explains everything:

https://www.henricocitizen.com/articles/richmond-international-airport-receives-5-5m-in-federal-funding-for-runway-enhancement/

Hmmmm...  Okay - it clears up WHAT is happening and the portion of the "why" (it's an FAA regulation) - but I'm not sure I understand the WHY from a functional standpoint? What exactly will having an offset do? Both from a safety standpoint - as well as practically...

[Niccckk]

Last night we had a couple diversions from NOVA due to weather. One notable one was this Play Airlines (owned by the same guy as WOW Air), diverted to Richmond from Reykjavik Iceland! Pretty cool! 

[wrldcoupe4]

Really cool. Could get used to seeing that!

[I miss RVA]

40 minutes ago, wrldcoupe4 said:

Really cool. Could get used to seeing that!

!!!  Same here.

[wrldcoupe4]

How does this affect RIC?

https://www.insidenova.com/headlines/city-council-approves-passenger-flight-proposal-for-manassas-regional-airport/article_1e5c2738-2a98-11ee-95c5-af04b6501df4.html

[Flood Zone]

Minimally, at most?

[blopp1234]

2 hours ago, wrldcoupe4 said:

How does this affect RIC?

https://www.insidenova.com/headlines/city-council-approves-passenger-flight-proposal-for-manassas-regional-airport/article_1e5c2738-2a98-11ee-95c5-af04b6501df4.html

Likely not at all. If anything this would hurt Charlottesville, but this airport would likely not draw anyone from RIC. This would really only be there to give people in prince William and Loudon counties a cheaper and closer alternative than Dulles or Reagan.

[eandslee]

1 hour ago, blopp1234 said:

Likely not at all. If anything this would hurt Charlottesville, but this airport would likely not draw anyone from RIC. This would really only be there to give people in prince William and Loudon counties a cheaper and closer alternative than Dulles or Reagan.

I agree - probably not much effect on RIC, but I won’t go as far to say that there will be no effect.  RIC’s catchment includes very little of the areas north of Fredericksburg, but there are some that will go to RIC for certain airlines (ex - Breeze) because the deals may be too good to resist and they don’t have Breeze at either of the DC airports.  We shall see what really happens though.  Hope there is little effect. 

[Shakman]

1 hour ago, blopp1234 said:

Likely not at all. If anything this would hurt Charlottesville, but this airport would likely not draw anyone from RIC. This would really only be there to give people in prince William and Loudon counties a cheaper and closer alternative than Dulles or Reagan.

This should not have any effect on Charlottesville and agree not RIC.

Edited August 4, 2023 by Shakman

[Niccckk]

On 8/4/2023 at 11:20 AM, eandslee said:

RIC for certain airlines (ex - Breeze) because the deals may be too good to resist and they don’t have Breeze at either of the DC airports.  We shall see what really happens though.  Hope there is little effect. 

^^^THIS exactly!  Our growing diversity of airlines is the reason our catchment area grows into the other airport's catchment areas. When I flew a month ago while I was in line, there was a family from Norfolk, and I overheard them saying that they didn't want to fly Spirit or Frontier to Orlando out of Norfolk, and they saw Southwest flew to Atlanta, then to Orlando out of Richmond at a good time for them, so they drove up from Norfolk to RIC because they prefer Southwest. Southwest does have a bigger presence at Norfolk, but they don't have direct Atlanta flights, and the Orlando flights I believe are only during weekends there. 

Edited August 5, 2023 by Niccckk

[Flood Zone]

But from the article’s description of even the second phase - if fully built-out - it seems like a drop in the bucket.

[blopp1234]

Some cool flights were diverted from Washington Dulles airport to RIC today due to tornado warnings in Northern VA. 
 

RIC received visitors such as Norse Atlantic’s 787 wide body aircraft inbound from London Gatwick airport, an Avianca A320 from San Salvador and a Play airlines A321 from Iceland. A nice change from the usual 737s, a320s, a220s, e jets and CRJs.

[Niccckk]

Woah. a 787 IN RICHMOND?