Good news for Ronaldsway at last

There's finally some good news for the airport, after passenger figures went up for the first time in seven months.

They had been dropping consistently, when compared to the equivalent months last year.

But that trend was reversed in November, with a 7% rise on 2011.

Over 59,500 passengers passed through the Ronaldsway terminal, the highest November figure for five years.

Liverpool, Gatwick and London City all saw large increases in the month, aided particularly by more flights being introduced by operators to the first two of those destinations.

The news was not so good for some of the smaller, regional routes such as Leeds, Luton and Oxford, though, which all saw significant declines of 25%, 30% and 40% respectively.

Yesterday it was confirmed to Manx Radio Flybe would be suspending its Luton service temporarily in the new year.

Airport director Ann Reynolds says major routes are responding well to increased competition on them, but the problems of the smaller ones underline the hard times our airlines are having.