Hi everyone,

I am interested in the history of Virgin Atlantic operations at LGW from their initial start in 1984 until the mid 1990s. I am aware that JFK, NRT, BOS and LAX were all served from Gatwick at some point. Does anyone know any information about any of these flights and when they operated out of LGW? Were they all served with 747s as well?

I'm interested to know the times the flights departed the airport as well?
I have a 1999 timetable which shows BOS flights but none of the others.

Please let me know if you have any information,

Many thanks,

MIA as well - the VS5/6. Went over to Heathrow sometime between the end of May 1997 and the beginning of August.
Can't for the life of me remember the precise times, but it was mid morning departure from LGW, and early 6-7am arrival back.

MIA was also served from LGW in the early years. VS only had the 747 for their long-haul ops. Plus it was EWR not JFK for New York flights to begin with.

Was and still is MCO.

We flew VS LGW-JFK 11/27/90 on G-TKYO "Maiden Japan" a 747-200. The flight departed at 5pm & arrived around 7:40pm. It still is one of the best coach experiences I've had to this date. It was memorable, well executed to keep passengers fed & entertained.

not really related but i was at LGW this morning at 1am and there was 3 virgin 747 parked on North terminal remote stands
seemed a waste of potential revenue

I thought they start on remote as they don't have first wave departures, more along the lines of 11am-2pm, so they get moved from remote onto contact after the first morning wave? I'm sure the same is done at MAN if the arriving a/c is early.

RWA380 wrote:

We flew VS LGW-JFK 11/27/90 on G-TKYO "Maiden Japan" a 747-200. The flight departed at 5pm & arrived around 7:40pm. It still is one of the best coach experiences I've had to this date. It was memorable, well executed to keep passengers fed & entertained.

Thank you for the information.
This must of been one of the last VS long haul departures of the day back then?

Also on another note, as it seems there were later departures in the 1990s, it would be safe to assume that there was more flexibility with aircraft utilization years ago, Whereas these days all VS long haul leave the LGW operation by early afternoon.

VS maiden flight to the US was LGW-EWR in 1984

I was on LGW-BOS in march 2001, operated by a 747-200 (G-VIRG)... so this flight operated up to then at least!

I remember the very small seat back tv... and fantastic service.. my only 747-200 rides...

Virgin also flew to Tokyo from LGW between the time British Caledonian was sold to BA and when VS moved operations to LHR in 1991.

jfk777 wrote:

Virgin also flew to Tokyo from LGW between the time British Caledonian was sold to BA and when VS moved operations to LHR in 1991.

I wish they'd bring that route back ! Crazy really to think the route was viable then with a 747 when they don't operate to Tokyo now, what with the huge growth in air travel since those days.

TC957 wrote:

jfk777 wrote:

Virgin also flew to Tokyo from LGW between the time British Caledonian was sold to BA and when VS moved operations to LHR in 1991.

I wish they'd bring that route back ! Crazy really to think the route was viable then with a 747 when they don't operate to Tokyo now, what with the huge growth in air travel since those days.

Japan has been in a sort of economic stagnation for more than a decade !

At one time there two JAL and two ANA plus two BA to Tokyo with Osaka and either Fukuoka or Nagoya with an MD11 of JAL.

Plus all freighters with NCA and JAL

Virgin had bums on seats however weren't making much money. Daddy said you need to change your ways.

So its Atlanta or bust !

TC957 wrote:

jfk777 wrote:

Virgin also flew to Tokyo from LGW between the time British Caledonian was sold to BA and when VS moved operations to LHR in 1991.

I wish they'd bring that route back ! Crazy really to think the route was viable then with a 747 when they don't operate to Tokyo now, what with the huge growth in air travel since those days.

Changed world I'm afraid.

In the early 1990's most passengers booked flight tickets via a travel agent. And a lot of travel agents didn't have CRS so they had to call the airline to make the booking and then hand wright the tickets. BA used to produce a booklet called fares fortnightly. It listed all theirs fares.

For the Japanese routes the fare list looked something like this..

F
J
Y
YE

That was it, a US route would have maybe 20-25 fare levels. With London-Japan there were no specials, no advance purchase fares, no low season fares. They just didn't need to discount. Japan made lots of cash and BA had double daily Tokyo flights, daily Osaka and services to Nagoya. I am guessing that VS also didn't have to discount NRT.

From Delta's December 1996 timetable: Delta had codeshares with Virgin on 3 flights out of Gatwick:

Boston
LGW-BOS VS 11 3:00pm - 5:10pm
no codeshare on the return BOS-LGW .... strange

Miami
LGW-MIA VS 5 11:15am - 3:45pm
MIA-LGW VS 6 6:20pm - 7:25am+1

Orlando
LGW-MCO VS 15 12:30pm - 4:40pm
MCO-LGW VS 16 7:10am - 9:15am+1

note this is just the DL/VS codeshares out of LGW

The October 1996 OAG shows Virgin flew out of Gatwick to just Boston and Orlando .... Miami was from Heathrow

http://www.departedflights.com/LGW96intro.html

richcandy wrote:

BA used to produce a booklet called fares fortnightly. It listed all theirs fares.

Thats a blast from the past

OA260 wrote:

richcandy wrote:

BA used to produce a booklet called fares fortnightly. It listed all theirs fares.

Thats a blast from the past

I had access to lots of these and lots of ABC airline guides (before they were OAG) and did I keep any of them? No! I wish I had.

Virgin Atlantic used to serve Kingston, Jamaica from LGW but it was cut sometime a few years ago. They still fly to MBJ right now.

British Airways used to serve Montego Bay, Jamaica from LGW but it was cut at some point. They still fly to KIN right now.

jamsco99 wrote:

not really related but i was at LGW this morning at 1am and there was 3 virgin 747 parked on North terminal remote stands
seemed a waste of potential revenue

It is low season, so aircraft utilisation will be lower.

I stand to be corrected but I would be surprised if VS flew NRT from LGW as it would have been weight-restricted before around 1998 when the runway was extended to just shy of 11,000ft.

I seem to remember that this was to allow BA to fly to South America without weight restriction - who promptly moved the longer flights to Heathrow! Again I stand to be corrected but I don't think any of the long-haul flights (which are mostly operated by 777s in the case of BA to destinations under 8 hours away) need that extra length now! The same holds true for VS who now fly mostly to the US and Caribbean.

How are VS doing at the moment? This is apparently the year of delivery from the recent changes, are they still on track? Certainly seems like they've had more direction in the last few years with lots of sensible decisions being made...

Bcal also flew to NRT - and LAX - well before the LGW runway extention.

I used to fly VS to London 2 or 3 times a year from BOS. The flight was most commonly operated with VS's B747-100 "Spirit of Sir Freddie". I think it was their only 747-100, but for a short hop like BOS-LGW, it was fine. I was actually kind of disappointed when they retired "Freddie" and substituted an A340. They're very big about having you leave comments in a book in Upper Class, and I remarked that Sir Richard must have designed the toilets: they were on the highly-curved outside wall of the A340 and I could barely pee standing up without hitting my head on the outer wall. I stopped flying VS when they moved VS11/12 to Heathrow. Their primary attraction for me was that they DIDN'T fly to Heathrow: at Gatwick I could be off the plane, through passport control and customs, and on the train to Victoria in under 15 minutes usually. I don't think that would be possible at Heathrow.

JosephJarvis wrote:

RWA380 wrote:

We flew VS LGW-JFK 11/27/90 on G-TKYO "Maiden Japan" a 747-200. The flight departed at 5pm & arrived around 7:40pm. It still is one of the best coach experiences I've had to this date. It was memorable, well executed to keep passengers fed & entertained.

Thank you for the information.
This must of been one of the last VS long haul departures of the day back then?

There were two VS 747's side by side at LGW, for the life of me I can't remember where the other flight was going, but it was the only other VS plane I saw, that was actively boarding while we were there that day. IIRC, it pulled out just before we did & we took off right behind them.

AndrewJM70 wrote:

I stand to be corrected but I would be surprised if VS flew NRT from LGW as it would have been weight-restricted before around 1998 when the runway was extended to just shy of 11,000ft.

I seem to remember that this was to allow BA to fly to South America without weight restriction - who promptly moved the longer flights to Heathrow! Again I stand to be corrected but I don't think any of the long-haul flights (which are mostly operated by 777s in the case of BA to destinations under 8 hours away) need that extra length now! The same holds true for VS who now fly mostly to the US and Caribbean.

Well you have been corrected by post 24 and he is correct, BCAL from 1983 and then from 1998 Virgin Atlantic both flew non stop from LGW to NRT with 747-200 with one flight each week calling at Moscow, due to Russian over flight restrictions being dropped the latter call was omitted in 1991 the same year that the NRT flight was transferred to LHR when it was opened to new carriers 'excluding Bermuda 2 airlines'. Virgin Atlantic initially moved JFK, LAX, NRT from LGW to LHR in September 1991 and after gaining more slots over the following years they gradually moved EWR, MIA and BOS from LGW over to LHR.

VS Caribbean flights didn't start untill around 1998 although Orlando has always been from LGW starting in 1986 along with LGW to Las Vegas which commenced in 1999.