First casualty of war: UK airline cancels flights amid Iran war energy crisis
A UK airline has permanently cancelled a flight due to pressure from the energy crisis caused by the US attack on Iran. Skybus operated an internal flight between London and the Cornish town of Newquay. The firm’s cancellation could be the first of many as air travel is hit by increasing pressure.
The National reported on 2 April:
Skybus operates daily flights between London Gatwick and the seaside town of Newquay.
The service was due to end on May 31, however the airline has announced that it will be ending now – nearly two months earlier than planned.
Adding:
The airline’s managing director Jonathon Hinkles said it was due to various reasons including the increase in fuel costs.
Hinkles said:
At a time of great economic uncertainty and steps being taken to conserve energy worldwide, it is neither environmentally nor economically sound for us to continue flying with vastly reduced passenger numbers.
It does beg a question: who the hell flies from London to Cornwall?
UK — Widespread price hikes
But bigger providers say they are under pressure too. Ryanair CEO Michael O’Leary said:
We don’t expect any disruption until early May, but if the war continues, we do run the risk of supply disruptions in Europe in May and June and obviously we hope the war will finish sooner than that and that the risk to supply will be eliminated.
The UK has been hit in other ways too. UK Pm Keir Starmer has tried to allay fears, but Brits are feeling the impact:
Families with a 55-litre diesel car face paying more than £100 at the pump for the first time since December 2022.
LBC reported on 23 March:
The Prime Minister chaired the meeting on Monday afternoon, during which the Chancellor spoke about steps she will set out in a statement to Parliament tomorrow.
Ms Reeves, Governor of the Bank of England Andrew Bailey and Energy Secretary Ed Miliband gave updates on the situation and stressed that de-escalation and ending the Iran conflict was “the best thing we can do for the economy”, Downing Street said in a readout.
It is unclear when the war will end and on what terms.
US-Israel attacked Iran first on 28 February without provocation. Iran was offering unprecedented concessions in negotiations at the time. The Pentagon has since stated there was no imminent threat from Iran. And the UN’s atomic watchdog, the IAEA, has said there is no evidence Iran was developing a nuclear weapon.
The US has achieved none of its original war aims. Iran predictably closed the Straits of Hormuz, a vital oil channel, once attacked – creating a global energy crisis. Far from being defeated, Iran has said the war will continue until “the enemy’s inevitable and permanent humiliation, disgrace, regret, and surrender”. Trump came to power on an anti-war ‘America First’ ticket. He now faces worldwide humiliation.
Featured image via Aerospace Global News
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Perhaps the consequences of this criminal war of aggression by UK allies will force ordinary people to understand our expectation of luxuries such as airline holidays and cheap car journeys is based on ignoring the brutal exploitation of the planet and the people of the Global South – and those luxuries are extremely fragile.
Although it is put who the hell flies from London to Cornwall ( I don’t live in either place or do this, so no COI) the public transport options are very time consuming and could be better. Also if you are immune suppressed or at risk of viral diseases there is virtually no information on how much ventilation there is on the various options or general information about infection control. Highly crowded public transport in winter is particularly risky from this point of view
Having been an avid user of public transport, bicycles (manual and eletric) and private transport (motorcycle and car), people who superficially remark ‘just use public transportation’ don’t realise the difference between public and private is night and day.
If you take public, you are at the mercy of the reliability of the service. Many a time I’ve been left high and dry by missing buses – either bus drivers speeding the route and not sticking to the timetable or just not present – or buses being too full to physically board with the driver going straight past, meaning you wait another 30 minutes for the next one (which isn’t viable if you have a job where you get fired if you go late). Before people remark ‘just go earlier’ like buckbroken corporate slaves, most bus services do not start earlier than 6am (most are 6:30am), which means if your job starts at 7am and your 6:30am bus flies by, congrats, you’re now late for work.
Then there’s the concept of carrying shopping. You can manage maybe 4 full bags on a busy bus, and those things will cut into your fingers if they’re heavy and you walk back a distance (in my case, up a hill). Maybe I could inefficiently order in one piece at a time by Amazon van delivery at horrible cost rates but 1) that costs more than the fuel price rise and 2) it is more fuel efficient for me to bulk shop and stuff it into my car in one go.
The ‘what about the shopping?’ argument catches most people off-guard. Bicycles can’t carry much, motorcycles can scarcely carry anything just short of a dozen ugly boxes the size of lunchboxes on the back, buses you’re limited by how many bags you can physically lift. If you’re a power weightlifter, sure, but if you’re a struggling single mother with a couple of screaming kids… hell on earth.
And a lot of poverished people cannot afford electric vehicles which cost about the same as a very low end house (140-200k). You’ll never be able to reduce those costs without corner cutting the ton of safety features electric vehicles require to not immediately spontaneously catch on fire due to electrical faults.
Frankly, people should use what works best for them. If a bicycle works for you, great. If a bus works because the service is good, excellent. Just don’t expect a single mother with 4 kids having to get shopping in a remote area to join in on the “fun” of public transport. There’s a reason why private vehicle prevalence is so high: it serves a very practical purpose.