I noticed over the last week or so that FI has been flying double to and from SEA, FI681 and FI683. Today, FI681 was a 763 and FI683 was a 752. Is that going to be the summer schedule for FI?

Yes, instead of the 2 seperate connection banks that FI have operated every summer since 2006, this summer FI is consolidating it into one big bank instead. Some destinations that previously had one flight in the smaller bank and one in the traditional one like SEA, YYZ, ARN, HEL among others have 2x daily flights almost wing-by-wing while some even have 3x daily wing-by-wing (CPH, AMS, BOS and sometimes JFK IIRC). So to answer the question both 681 and 683 will operate daily until October, when it should revert to 681 only.

There are a few European flights outside of that "mega bank" but those are O&D only.

SRQKEF wrote:

Yes, instead of the 2 seperate connection banks that FI have operated every summer since 2006, this summer FI is consolidating it into one big bank instead. Some destinations that previously had one flight in the smaller bank and one in the traditional one like SEA, YYZ, ARN, HEL among others have 2x daily flights almost wing-by-wing while some even have 3x daily wing-by-wing (CPH, AMS, BOS and sometimes JFK IIRC). So to answer the question both 681 and 683 will operate daily until October, when it should revert to 681 only.

There are a few European flights outside of that "mega bank" but those are O&D only.

Interesting. How does this all look at KEF, over capacity with connections at times and quiet as a mouse other times?

Kno wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

Yes, instead of the 2 seperate connection banks that FI have operated every summer since 2006, this summer FI is consolidating it into one big bank instead. Some destinations that previously had one flight in the smaller bank and one in the traditional one like SEA, YYZ, ARN, HEL among others have 2x daily flights almost wing-by-wing while some even have 3x daily wing-by-wing (CPH, AMS, BOS and sometimes JFK IIRC). So to answer the question both 681 and 683 will operate daily until October, when it should revert to 681 only.

There are a few European flights outside of that "mega bank" but those are O&D only.

Interesting. How does this all look at KEF, over capacity with connections at times and quiet as a mouse other times?

On the busiest days I'm sure KEF will be like a total zoo from 5am-8am and 2pm-5pm! However, WW seems to be going in the opposite direction and is staggering their flights between what seems like 2-3 seperate banks this summer. Some of those flights work together with 1-8 hour connections while others require spending the night in KEF.

In the past times outside the hub banks were indeed eerily quiet but that has also changed in recent years. Here's a rough timeline of a basic day at KEF this summer:

12am-2am: AB used to be the king at this hour, but not anymore for obvious reasons. 4U, LH, HG, OS, VY and a few other airlines arrive from Europe just before midnight and depart back for a redeye in this timeframe.
2am-3:30am: Quiet
3:30-5am: Most WOW N-American arrivals.
5am-7am: All Icelandair N-American arrivals and most WW European departures (ZOO!)
7am-8:30am: All FI European departures apart from a few O&D afternoon flights.
8:30am-1pm: easyJet and Norwegian mostly operate within this time frame. U2+DS have 8 destinations while DY+D8 has 6 this summer IIRC. BA, LH and SK also usually operate during these hours, to LHR/LCY, FRA/MUC and OSL/CPH respectively. During this time the US3 and AC also arrive and depart. The new WOW bank arrives from N-America around 11am and departs for Europe at noon.
1pm-2pm: Most WW European arrivals and the year-round daily FI afternoon CPH flight.
2pm-4pm: All FI European arrivals apart from O&D. Most WOW N-American departures.
4pm-5pm: FI European O&D departures and Greenland flights on NY/GL.
5pm-6pm: All FI N-American departures.
6pm-10pm: WOW often has their California departures around 6pm. While Wizz Air also operates in the morning, most of their 11 destinations are served within this time frame and it's not unusual to see several W6 A320 series aircraft on the ramp. AY flies to HEL daily within this time frame and U2/DS also has some flights at this time.
10pm-12am: European redeye carriers mentioned above start to arrive. Meanwhile, the smaller WW bank arrives from Europe and departs for N-America and the Icelandair O&D flights return to base.

Obviously, I missed some flights but this shows that the only truly quiet time in summer is 2am-3:30am. Winter is a whole other story, at least for the moment.

Despite the crazy amount of flights the terminal is coping a bit better than in recent years due to expansion works and modernising efforts by Isavia. However, one area that is still way too small is the non-Schengen zone which seriously needs expansion. The area before passport control isn't too bad anymore apart from a few days a year.

regards!
Sveinn

Ord as well

SRQKEF wrote:

...There are a few European flights outside of that "mega bank" but those are O&D only.

Would much of that O&D traffic actually be de facto connecting traffic, comprised of pax from points outside of Iceland continuing on to their final destination after a stopover? ...assuming FI still promote stopovers in Iceland?

SRQKEF wrote:

Kno wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

Yes, instead of the 2 seperate connection banks that FI have operated every summer since 2006, this summer FI is consolidating it into one big bank instead. Some destinations that previously had one flight in the smaller bank and one in the traditional one like SEA, YYZ, ARN, HEL among others have 2x daily flights almost wing-by-wing while some even have 3x daily wing-by-wing (CPH, AMS, BOS and sometimes JFK IIRC). So to answer the question both 681 and 683 will operate daily until October, when it should revert to 681 only.

There are a few European flights outside of that "mega bank" but those are O&D only.

Interesting. How does this all look at KEF, over capacity with connections at times and quiet as a mouse other times?

On the busiest days I'm sure KEF will be like a total zoo from 5am-8am and 2pm-5pm! However, WW seems to be going in the opposite direction and is staggering their flights between what seems like 2-3 seperate banks this summer. Some of those flights work together with 1-8 hour connections while others require spending the night in KEF.

In the past times outside the hub banks were indeed eerily quiet but that has also changed in recent years. Here's a rough timeline of a basic day at KEF this summer:

12am-2am: AB used to be the king at this hour, but not anymore for obvious reasons. 4U, LH, HG, OS, VY and a few other airlines arrive from Europe just before midnight and depart back for a redeye in this timeframe.
2am-3:30am: Quiet
3:30-5am: Most WOW N-American arrivals.
5am-7am: All Icelandair N-American arrivals and most WW European departures (ZOO!)
7am-8:30am: All FI European departures apart from a few O&D afternoon flights.
8:30am-1pm: easyJet and Norwegian mostly operate within this time frame. U2+DS have 8 destinations while DY+D8 has 6 this summer IIRC. BA, LH and SK also usually operate during these hours, to LHR/LCY, FRA/MUC and OSL/CPH respectively. During this time the US3 and AC also arrive and depart. The new WOW bank arrives from N-America around 11am and departs for Europe at noon.
1pm-2pm: Most WW European arrivals and the year-round daily FI afternoon CPH flight.
2pm-4pm: All FI European arrivals apart from O&D. Most WOW N-American departures.
4pm-5pm: FI European O&D departures and Greenland flights on NY/GL.
5pm-6pm: All FI N-American departures.
6pm-10pm: WOW often has their California departures around 6pm. While Wizz Air also operates in the morning, most of their 11 destinations are served within this time frame and it's not unusual to see several W6 A320 series aircraft on the ramp. AY flies to HEL daily within this time frame and U2/DS also has some flights at this time.
10pm-12am: European redeye carriers mentioned above start to arrive. Meanwhile, the smaller WW bank arrives from Europe and departs for N-America and the Icelandair O&D flights return to base.

Obviously, I missed some flights but this shows that the only truly quiet time in summer is 2am-3:30am. Winter is a whole other story, at least for the moment.

Despite the crazy amount of flights the terminal is coping a bit better than in recent years due to expansion works and modernising efforts by Isavia. However, one area that is still way too small is the non-Schengen zone which seriously needs expansion. The area before passport control isn't too bad anymore apart from a few days a year.

regards!
Sveinn

Thank you for these details! Are the gates common use or designated to specific airlines? I can't imagine how FI and WOW have all those flights connecting at similar times.

The terminal looks like a small regional airport on google maps, it's hard for me to imagine so much activity there.

Tango-Bravo wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

...There are a few European flights outside of that "mega bank" but those are O&D only.

Would much of that O&D traffic actually be de facto connecting traffic, comprised of pax from points outside of Iceland continuing on to their final destination after a stopover? ...assuming FI still promote stopovers in Iceland?

Not necessarily much of it, but certainly some portion! Those destinations all have healthy O&D to/from Iceland itself. CPH and LHR have year-round afternoon flights and in the summer destinations like FRA, ARN, OSL, HEL, AMS, LGW and CDG get afternoon flights as well. The largest O&D destination by far is CPH for historical reasons and FI operates 2-3 flights there in the afternoon/evening along with 2-3 wing-by-wing flights in the morning.

And yes, the MyStopover option is still available and very popular, with a free stay of up to 7 days.

Kno wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

Kno wrote:

Interesting. How does this all look at KEF, over capacity with connections at times and quiet as a mouse other times?

On the busiest days I'm sure KEF will be like a total zoo from 5am-8am and 2pm-5pm! However, WW seems to be going in the opposite direction and is staggering their flights between what seems like 2-3 seperate banks this summer. Some of those flights work together with 1-8 hour connections while others require spending the night in KEF.

In the past times outside the hub banks were indeed eerily quiet but that has also changed in recent years. Here's a rough timeline of a basic day at KEF this summer:

12am-2am: AB used to be the king at this hour, but not anymore for obvious reasons. 4U, LH, HG, OS, VY and a few other airlines arrive from Europe just before midnight and depart back for a redeye in this timeframe.
2am-3:30am: Quiet
3:30-5am: Most WOW N-American arrivals.
5am-7am: All Icelandair N-American arrivals and most WW European departures (ZOO!)
7am-8:30am: All FI European departures apart from a few O&D afternoon flights.
8:30am-1pm: easyJet and Norwegian mostly operate within this time frame. U2+DS have 8 destinations while DY+D8 has 6 this summer IIRC. BA, LH and SK also usually operate during these hours, to LHR/LCY, FRA/MUC and OSL/CPH respectively. During this time the US3 and AC also arrive and depart. The new WOW bank arrives from N-America around 11am and departs for Europe at noon.
1pm-2pm: Most WW European arrivals and the year-round daily FI afternoon CPH flight.
2pm-4pm: All FI European arrivals apart from O&D. Most WOW N-American departures.
4pm-5pm: FI European O&D departures and Greenland flights on NY/GL.
5pm-6pm: All FI N-American departures.
6pm-10pm: WOW often has their California departures around 6pm. While Wizz Air also operates in the morning, most of their 11 destinations are served within this time frame and it's not unusual to see several W6 A320 series aircraft on the ramp. AY flies to HEL daily within this time frame and U2/DS also has some flights at this time.
10pm-12am: European redeye carriers mentioned above start to arrive. Meanwhile, the smaller WW bank arrives from Europe and departs for N-America and the Icelandair O&D flights return to base.

Obviously, I missed some flights but this shows that the only truly quiet time in summer is 2am-3:30am. Winter is a whole other story, at least for the moment.

Despite the crazy amount of flights the terminal is coping a bit better than in recent years due to expansion works and modernising efforts by Isavia. However, one area that is still way too small is the non-Schengen zone which seriously needs expansion. The area before passport control isn't too bad anymore apart from a few days a year.

regards!
Sveinn

Thank you for these details! Are the gates common use or designated to specific airlines? I can't imagine how FI and WOW have all those flights connecting at similar times.

They are common use in theory IIRC. However, FI pretty much has its gates and WW has theirs. The last few years more and more flights leave from remote stands on both sides of the terminal. WOW and FI pretty much get equal amounts of jetway gates on any given day, with FI maybe getting 2-3 more due to its larger fleet size.

Regarding all those connections, both airlines have it down to an art. You may not have the most comfortable connection on the busiest days, but rest assured that you'll catch your next flight even with connecting times of 40-60 minutes.

1.6 million travelled UK-Iceland-UK in 2017, up 20% - from 1.2 million - in 2016. Excluding seasonality, almost 4,400 people travelled UK-Iceland-UK each day. Of course, these figures include those travelling to/from North America via KEF.

Just over 1 million travelled from London, with flights to KEF from LHR, LGW, STN, LTN, and LCY.

MSP-KEF will have two daily 757's just 10 minutes apart as opposed to the single 767 last summer. Switches to 737 MAX 8 in October.

SRQKEF wrote:

Tango-Bravo wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

...There are a few European flights outside of that "mega bank" but those are O&D only.

Would much of that O&D traffic actually be de facto connecting traffic, comprised of pax from points outside of Iceland continuing on to their final destination after a stopover? ...assuming FI still promote stopovers in Iceland?

Not necessarily much of it, but certainly some portion! Those destinations all have healthy O&D to/from Iceland itself. CPH and LHR have year-round afternoon flights and in the summer destinations like FRA, ARN, OSL, HEL, AMS, LGW and CDG get afternoon flights as well. The largest O&D destination by far is CPH for historical reasons and FI operates 2-3 flights there in the afternoon/evening along with 2-3 wing-by-wing flights in the morning.

And yes, the MyStopover option is still available and very popular, with a free stay of up to 7 days.

No. FI has changed their summer schedule. Evening flights to FRA, OSL, HEL, ARN are not in their schedule. FRA was always very critical due to curfew in FRA. Instead flights to OSL, CPH, HEL (for example), are in the morning as wing-to-wing. FI216 to CPH and FI454 to LHR are daily. FI216 was not daily last summer only on Saturdays, if I remember correctly.

Ref.: These informations are taken from their summer schedule in their high peak period: 15JUL - 22JUL.

IceAir778 wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

Tango-Bravo wrote:

Would much of that O&D traffic actually be de facto connecting traffic, comprised of pax from points outside of Iceland continuing on to their final destination after a stopover? ...assuming FI still promote stopovers in Iceland?

Not necessarily much of it, but certainly some portion! Those destinations all have healthy O&D to/from Iceland itself. CPH and LHR have year-round afternoon flights and in the summer destinations like FRA, ARN, OSL, HEL, AMS, LGW and CDG get afternoon flights as well. The largest O&D destination by far is CPH for historical reasons and FI operates 2-3 flights there in the afternoon/evening along with 2-3 wing-by-wing flights in the morning.

And yes, the MyStopover option is still available and very popular, with a free stay of up to 7 days.

No. FI has changed their summer schedule. Evening flights to FRA, OSL, HEL, ARN are not in their schedule. FRA was always very critical due to curfew in FRA. Instead flights to OSL, CPH, HEL (for example), are in the morning as wing-to-wing. FI216 to CPH and FI454 to LHR are daily. FI216 was not daily last summer only on Saturdays, if I remember correctly.

Ref.: These informations are taken from their summer schedule in their high peak period: 15JUL - 22JUL.

I'm pretty sure that there are still some European afternoon departures from KEF this summer (FI212, 454, 506, 524 etc)... However the midnight redeye departures to Europe have indeed been consolidated into the morning bank, as have the morning flights to USA/YYZ.

SRQKEF wrote:

SEA, YYZ, ARN, HEL among others have 2x daily flights almost wing-by-wing while some even have 3x daily wing-by-wing (CPH, AMS, BOS and sometimes JFK IIRC).

What days will BOS see 3x daily flights from FI? I've searched and haven't found any days with 3 flights.

NickolayAv wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

SEA, YYZ, ARN, HEL among others have 2x daily flights almost wing-by-wing while some even have 3x daily wing-by-wing (CPH, AMS, BOS and sometimes JFK IIRC).

What days will BOS see 3x daily flights from FI? I've searched and haven't found any days with 3 flights.

Going by my experience I think they’ll add the extra flights with fairly short notice. However, I must admit that this was only from memory from a conversation I had with a member of FI route planning earlier this winter and I’m not a 100% sure if the 3rd flight is still in the plans. Maybe it’s just 1x 767 and 1x 757.

SRQKEF wrote:

IceAir778 wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

Not necessarily much of it, but certainly some portion! Those destinations all have healthy O&D to/from Iceland itself. CPH and LHR have year-round afternoon flights and in the summer destinations like FRA, ARN, OSL, HEL, AMS, LGW and CDG get afternoon flights as well. The largest O&D destination by far is CPH for historical reasons and FI operates 2-3 flights there in the afternoon/evening along with 2-3 wing-by-wing flights in the morning.

And yes, the MyStopover option is still available and very popular, with a free stay of up to 7 days.

No. FI has changed their summer schedule. Evening flights to FRA, OSL, HEL, ARN are not in their schedule. FRA was always very critical due to curfew in FRA. Instead flights to OSL, CPH, HEL (for example), are in the morning as wing-to-wing. FI216 to CPH and FI454 to LHR are daily. FI216 was not daily last summer only on Saturdays, if I remember correctly.

Ref.: These informations are taken from their summer schedule in their high peak period: 15JUL - 22JUL.

I'm pretty sure that there are still some European afternoon departures from KEF this summer (FI212, 454, 506, 524 etc)... However the midnight redeye departures to Europe have indeed been consolidated into the morning bank, as have the morning flights to USA/YYZ.

FI212 is not this summer instead they have FI216 daily instead of 1-2x last Summer . FI454 is. FI506 leave KEF in the morning and FI524 to FRA is not in the afternoon

NickolayAv wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

SEA, YYZ, ARN, HEL among others have 2x daily flights almost wing-by-wing while some even have 3x daily wing-by-wing (CPH, AMS, BOS and sometimes JFK IIRC).

What days will BOS see 3x daily flights from FI? I've searched and haven't found any days with 3 flights.

During the high peak period in the Summer. FI will fly to BOS three times a day:
FI637 dep KEF at 16:30z 6x (not on Wednesday)
FI631 dep KEF at 17:00z, 17:15z and 17:20z (depends on weekday) daily
FI633 dep KEF at 18:05z daily

Does KEF see any cargo freighters?

IceAir778 wrote:

SRQKEF wrote:

IceAir778 wrote:

No. FI has changed their summer schedule. Evening flights to FRA, OSL, HEL, ARN are not in their schedule. FRA was always very critical due to curfew in FRA. Instead flights to OSL, CPH, HEL (for example), are in the morning as wing-to-wing. FI216 to CPH and FI454 to LHR are daily. FI216 was not daily last summer only on Saturdays, if I remember correctly.

Ref.: These informations are taken from their summer schedule in their high peak period: 15JUL - 22JUL.

I'm pretty sure that there are still some European afternoon departures from KEF this summer (FI212, 454, 506, 524 etc)... However the midnight redeye departures to Europe have indeed been consolidated into the morning bank, as have the morning flights to USA/YYZ.

FI212 is not this summer instead they have FI216 daily instead of 1-2x last Summer . FI454 is. FI506 leave KEF in the morning and FI524 to FRA is not in the afternoon

Ah I see. Hadn't seen that, thanks!

Really surprised 212 is now seasonal. That 1pm CPH departure time has been a staple of their route network as far back as I can remember... However, they still have the same amount of flights there as before. Still a shame because I love having the 9pm arrival back in KEF!

dfwjim1 wrote:

Does KEF see any cargo freighters?

Yes, Icelandair Cargo has 2 757Fs in their fleet. Those operate a daily run to EMA/LGG and also a few weekly flights to JFK. Bluebird Cargo also has a daily 734 to DUB.

Apart from that, nothing scheduled. However, quite a lot of cargo aircraft fuel stop here during TATL ops, including regular stops by some lovely Antonovs!

One of the reasons that more cargo flights aren't needed are the great cargo capabilities of the 757s and 767s in FI's fleet and the successful marketing by their cargo department. And yes, before someone asks, they do carry a lot of fresh fish!