Manchester Summer 2025

Some preliminiary adjustments to Virgin's network at Manchester next year. (stc)

VS73 Orlando - 5x weekly A350-1000 - resumes 31 March 2025 through end of season.
VS75 Orlando - 7x weekly A350-1000 - service switches to A350 on 30 March 2025.
VS85 Las Vegas - 3x weekly A350-1000 - resumes 29 April 2025 through end of season (one month earlier than this year)
VS109 Atlanta - daily A330-300 - no change.
VS127 New York-JFK - daily A350-1000 - A350 switch from 30 March 2025 - seems like a permanent change.

Looks like Manchester will be all A350 ops, aside from Atlanta.

No Clubhouse, as discussed in detail on this forum, however the eastern half of the terminal is reopening in May alongside the second pier - there will be a few more lounges.

[mitchja]

I'm guessing that JFK A350 will be a leisure config? That's a big drop from 31 to just 16 J seats. Just shows the state of play with none-leisure based TATL flights from MAN. Speaks volumes as well that none of the US carriers have ever returned to MAN since COVID.

I do also hope the VS keep the VS109 departure time constant though out the year as well. Having an early departure in summer and a later departure in Winter is utter madness and the later 18:45 arrival into ATL means you start running out of same-day onward DL connections.

I'm guessing that JFK A350 will be a leisure config? That's a big drop from 31 to just 16 J seats. Just shows the state of play with none-leisure based TATL flights from MAN. Speaks volumes as well that none of the US carriers have ever returned to MAN since COVID.

I do also hope the VS keep the VS109 departure time constant though out the year as well. Having an early departure in summer and a later departure in Winter is utter madness and the later 18:45 arrival into ATL means you start running out of same-day onward DL connections.

Virgin have used the high J A350s from MAN before, so remains to be seen whether or not they deploy them on JFK

I agree with James over the VS109. The 13.00 departure is too late and severly restricts onward flights from ATL. This year our February flight had a load of 122 whilst a friend travelled 2 weeks later with a load of 75. Our return in March was a little better at 191. In the past years loads were always in the 200s. This year we had to overnight in ATL as the only flight down to RSW arrived after midnight US time !! I wonder how long the flight will continue in the winter with this level of load.

Totally agree.

It is strange because ATL for most is a connecting airport rather than a final destination airport. I seem to recall on one flight it being announced that something like 90% of passengers were connecting.

Last year the arrival time at our final destination was about 23:30 which messed up my body clock badly for days. Normally E to W I adjust very quickly.

Already looking at alternative options for November, including via LHR or with BA.

Another +1 for the craziness of current flight times out of MAN. For some destinations, onwards connections at ATL from MAN are now impossible or require an overnight stopover.

An even bigger problem in my case is simply price. Non-Saturday night stay TATL business fares are now absolutely eye watering; they've doubled in about 6 years. Airlines (VS included) have long complained about corporate/business travel not recovering to pre-pandemic levels. In my case, I've had to cut back on trips. I can only conclude that airlines feel it's better to over charge those still willing to pay rather than try and win new business. But surely the current fare levels will soon start testing this strategy.

[mitchja]

Just done a dummy booking MAN>JFK for early April 2025 and it is indeed showing as being the low 16 J seat A350 seat map.

Overall if you travel in Upper and use vouchers to do it this is a disappointing change. Yes the A350 is a nicer aircraft but if the 2 initial seats offered for reward are gone there is much less chance more will be released in a 16J A350. At least with the A330-300 this was a regular occurrence as you got closer to departure date. Yes, very rarely they send up a high J A350 but this definitely isn’t the norm.

I'm guessing that JFK A350 will be a leisure config? That's a big drop from 31 to just 16 J seats. Just shows the state of play with none-leisure based TATL flights from MAN. Speaks volumes as well that none of the US carriers have ever returned to MAN since COVID.

I do also hope the VS keep the VS109 departure time constant though out the year as well. Having an early departure in summer and a later departure in Winter is utter madness and the later 18:45 arrival into ATL means you start running out of same-day onward DL connections.

I think some context is needed with some of the US carriers.

AA ditched the 757, 767 and A330 fleets during COVID and deliveries of new aircraft up to now have not replaced all the capacity they unceremoniously ditched. It seems they’re still on the back foot. It’s not MAN, but BA are similarly on the back foot having ditched the 747s and the 777X’s they ordered to replace them being nowhere near being certified (partly due to the well-publicised issues affecting Boeing). Since then, Aer Lingus have used their UK AOC to commence long-haul ops ex-MAN and that presents connection opportunities onto AA flights even if JFK isn’t as big of a hub as PHL has become since the merger with US Airways. So unless AA do plan to eventually relaunch MAN-PHL, I wonder if there’s a plan being driven by IAG to use Aer Lingus UK as their vehicle for serving the MAN-US market moving forward?

DL had handed over the MAN flying to VS before COVID, though they were supposed to be taking over MAN-BOS with the 757 in 2020 and that wasn’t revived. I’ve no idea if they made fleet cutbacks of their own.

United is the one I’m struggling to understand. 2020 was supposed to see the 767 on MAN-EWR and they were talking up the opportunities at MAN just one month before COVID. Since the borders reopened, there’s been nothing. In the meantime, they’ve opened new routes to places with the aircraft they used to send to MAN such as Tenerife (since when did the package holiday resorts that way suddenly became the places to be for the US market?)

As for using the leisure A350s on MAN-JFK, I wonder if VS are thinking of using the opportunity to charge a premium in Upper as well as other factors such as aircraft scheduling or if the demand is higher in cabins further down the plane?

[mitchja]

Even before COVID though VS were sending leisure config 744's to JFK from MAN with just 14 x J seats as I remember having a booking which switched from the usual A333 to a B744 and then being asked at JFK if I minded downgrading when I checked in. There was a good few months VS op'ed their B744's on the MAN>JFK route.

Even before COVID though VS were sending leisure config 744's to JFK from MAN with just 14 x J seats as I remember having a booking which switched from the usual A333 to a B744 and then being asked at JFK if I minded downgrading when I checked in. There was a good few months VS op'ed their B744's on the MAN>JFK route.

I remember that period during 2018/19 as I too was caught out by having one night extra in New York when they revised the schedule. Wasn’t that partly down to the 787 engine issues meaning the A330s were requisitioned to LHR to cover?

Then again, I also remember the spiel about the A330-200s inferring they would be primarily used out of MAN that didn’t end up being the case in reality; though I remember the Upper cabins on those being like Marmite.

Did a dummy booking for MAN-MCO (and return) and the A350s are not on the VS75 or VS76. The are on the VS73 and VS74 but definitely not on the earlier flights.

I have just done a booking from 10-24 Apr and the 75 and 74 are both showing to be 350's. Maybe you were looking to early in the month?

Thanks for posting this is super useful. I remember flying DL to ATL and the flight departed at 10:20 for the very reason James and David had mentioned. I get VS109 the most what I can see happening over time is VS bringing in the NEO for ATL flight. There is also a rumour doing the rounds that VS are looking to order more NEO's at the Farnborough airshow.

My biggest issue with VS at MAN is the lack of continuity in the product. I would book upper class every time if there was a clubhouse and some kind of arrivals lounge. The crews out of Manchester are pretty good so no complaints there. So what I do is book premium and then upgrade closer to the time. That being said the airport being under construction hasn't helped things as the check in zone have move multiple times over the past 12 months. It's been a lottery what gate you get also. But we are coming to the end of that process next year so hopefully the ground experience will improve. I hope VS stick with the A gats going forward as Emirates will be moving into the B gates when that goes live. I also really hope we see LAX come back for better connections on the West Coast and Hawaii.

Not sure if this is relevant to anyone, but our flight back from MCO-MAN (VS74) this August is the 350 with small number of UC seats, and I did manage to bag a seat after the initial release of 2. It is definitely more hit and miss though, you certainly can't rely on them releasing more!

That’s why I always advise people to look out for the A330/A330 NEO’s as there is more availability. That being said if you check 2 to 3 weeks before departure they can sometimes add more.

Hi all, new to this forum and from what I’ve already read, it’s been really helpful. I just need that little bit more assurance. When I booked our holiday last year we were flying out of Manchester to Las Vegas on a brand new A350-1041. Just before Christmas, I got an email about a slight flight time change and an aircraft change. To an A330-300. And obviously changed our seats and moved my disabled daughter to a row behind. Anyways. After many phone calls, I was told that there was a good chance of another change. Do you lovely helpful people think it is just because of the winter schedule and when we travel mid June we will be back on an A350-1041?

I have had a similar experience, where my original booked flight (on A350 aircraft) has been changed just before Xmas. We were notified that the time had slightly changed and the aircraft would now be the older A330. We have re chosen our seats, but we’re wondering if the aircraft is likely to change again (we are flying end of June)? I, possibly wrongly, assumed all flight between Manchester and Orlando this summer would be on the A350 aircraft.

[mitchja]

There is no fixed aircraft on any VS route so a particular A/C type is never guaranteed until you actually board it unfortunately.

If the A333 is used on the LAS route, approximately 5 Upper Class seats should also be blocked which are used for crew rest because the A333 has no crew rest bunks unlike all the other VS A/C types.

VS85 switches over to the A330 on the 15th of June from what I can tell via Google flights. So that aircraft muss then go onto the VS127 after that.