The UK’s fifth largest carrier, Monarch Airlines, has ceased flying and administrator KPMG has been appointed to the firm. More than 1,800 of the airline’s 2,100 staff have been made redundant. Its collapse triggered an airlift, organised by the Civil Aviation Authority, to repatriate around 110,000 passengers who were stranded while on holiday. Flights booked by another 750,000 travellers who were planning to fly over the winter were also cancelled. Monarch’s last flight was ZB3785 from Tel Aviv, which landed at
Manchester shortly before 4am on October 2. Its fleet comprised nine Airbus A320s, 25 A321s and a single Boeing 737-800.
The airline’s closure leaves attractive slots at major airports across the UK and abroad unused, at least in the short term. Monarch provided approximately 5% of the capacity at Gatwick (LGW), around 15% of the seats available from Birmingham (BHX), almost 10% at Leeds Bradford, nearly 6% at Luton, and 7% at Manchester. It also accounted for around one third of the traffic through Gibraltar Airport. In Europe its largest stations were at Alicante, Faro, Málaga, Palma de Mallorca and Tenerife South.
Shortly after Monarch stopped trading, Jet2.com
