KLM upgrade selected flights to Embraer 190 Winter 2015-16

[Humberside]

The KLM timetable is showing the KL1497/1498 (teatime flight) as being Embraer 190 operated from Sunday 25th October (start of winter season). From Monday 4th January the KL1489/1490 (mid-morning flight) becomes Embraer 190 operated and the KL1497/1498 reverts to a Fokker 70. Then on Monday 15th February the KL1497/1498 gets the Embraer 190 again and the KL1489/1490 goes back to a Fokker 70. Summer schedule is showing all Fokker 70 operated at this stage.

The Embraer 190 seats 100 passengers compared to 80 on a Fokker 70

Excellent news. I guess KLM are fitting in HUY rotations on the Embraer around higher priorities, hence why it is mostly on the teatime flight (I presume the least busy as it's dropped on a Saturday?) except for the quieter period after Christmas/New Year - however it hopefully it will be the start of a permanent capacity increase after the increased loads over recent months

[mrmoose]

Fantastic news, and shows klms commitment to HUY. Works out an extra 14000 seats a year, if changes continue into next summer!

[kirmingtonuser]

This increase in capacity is very welcome. The use of a larger aircraft has recently been seen as the most likely way in which this would be achieved. They do not have to find an extra pair of slots at AMS and, in any case, connectivity at lunchtime is not as good as at the busier times.
Assuming two rows of business class seats, the Fokker 70 has a capacity of 76, which produces about 155,000 seats p.a. on the HUY route. If 2015 is heading for 124,000 passengers, this is a load factor of 80%. One E190 rotation on six days per week would increase the capacity to about 170,000 enabling passenger numbers to grow to 136,000 if the same load factor could be achieved.
Presumably it will not be long before the equipment is switched to three rotations of the Embraer 175. This would produce a capacity of 180,000 and this would hopefully soon be followed by passenger numbers of 144,000 p.a.

[lbaspotter]

Good to see that Humberside based KLM Fokker 70 crews are finally now been retrained onto the Embraer 175/190 fleet, hence the reasoning for the Embraers been rotated on the Amsterdam - Humberside route this winter 2015/16 season.

[pug]

Do we have crews based locally again? I thought they stopped that a while ago?

Still, promising and will be hopefully trying out the new aircraft in the future..

[kirmingtonuser]

The introduction of the Embraer 190 seems to be having an effect on the leisure market. A forum-poster booked a weekend return to AMS from HUY as it was £50 cheaper than flying from LBA. Unfortunately the return flight (on Sunday 1st November) was cancelled due to fog.