Air Southwest are to close permanently on September 30th, 2011. The airline will axe all routes to Plymouth two weeks before this, on September 14th, and then all routes to Newquay, including Aberdeen, Bristol, Cork, Dublin and Leeds Bradford will by cut at the end of September. Eastern Airways, which had run the Air Southwest airline as a separate brand after taking it over last year, said they had no choice, as the airline is 'no longer financial viable'. All passengers will receive a full refund. Read the full story here

If you're flying to small, rather obscure parts of the UK, you'll trip over the small operations of Air Southwest and Eastern Airways. The two are now linked, following the takeover of Air Southwest by Eastern Airways.

Both are, in world aviation terms, tiny. Air Southwest (or Air South West Ltd. to give it its full name) has its main hub at Plymouth City Airport in Devon, but with many of its routes operating out of Newquay, using just five small rather old and tired Dash 8 planes. Meanwhile Eastern Airways has its main base at Humberside, and operates a fleet of 30 planes, which is a whole lot more impressive when you realise that most of them are tiny BAe Jetstream 41s seating just 29 passengers.

The two airlines are also very different. Air Southwest is a low-cost, no-frills operation, selling fares over the web, with few perks and no frequent-flyer scheme (although it does have a business class lounge) and uses the low fares, web-based format for bookings with over 90% of all bookings made online. The airline has a slogan of "Fly Britain's Local Airline".

Eastern Airways is however a very different beast, very much full service, even to the level of bringing out hot towels on a little silver tray before the flight.

Of course, you shouldn't mistake Air Southwest or Eastern Airways for Southwest Airlines or Eastern Air Lines. The former is a low-cost player operating in the United States (but originally called Air Southwest Co. of all things), while the later went bust in 1991, after having operated flights to London using ex-Qantas 747s out of Miami. The UK companies are very different, and staff are sensitive about the name; get it wrong at your peril.

How these two very different entities will get along together - let alone merge - is anyone's guess, but at the moment if you want to visit some of the more obscure airfields around the UK, this unlikely pairing is your way to do it.

Air Southwest operate aircraft just as one class, now that Air Southwest has abandoned its Business Class product Business Plus. Instead Air Southwest now offer a premium service called Advantage. This offers exactly the same service, except there is no curtain, and it excludes the word business. As a result, you'll pay a lot less APD tax.

Air Southwest Advantage Class offers some distinct benefits, including lounge access, free food on board, and more luggage. If you book at the last minute, the cost of this class is only six pounds more than full economy - and definitely worth it. You gain Business lounge access, free on-board refreshments (one alcoholic drink and one sandwich), and an increased baggage allowance of 30 kg, plus free changes to booking up to two hours before flight departure, and fast track security at Gatwick.

Air Southwest Bombardier Dash 8-311

Air Southwest Dash 8 cabin

Air Southwest operate just one type of aircraft, the Bombardier Dash 8-311 (previously known as de Havilland Canada Dash 8, hence their Air Southwest code of DHC-8), a 50 seat passenger version that entered service in 1989. Small, noisy and cramt, they were all bought secondhand from British Airways when BA abandoned the Newquay route.

They have a highly unusual seating plan for the first two rows: the seats are grouped together in a block of 4. This is great boon if there are four of you travelling down together, and a right pain, if you are four individuals who don't know each other - because, trust me, you'll know each other well by the end of it. If you are travelling alone, the best seats are definitely not in row 1 or 2.

Air Southwest Dash 8 at Newquay

Seat layout is 2-2 throughout the rest of the plane (seats A and D are windows) across 13 rows (1 to 14 but there is no 13). Seat pitch is 30 inches. Overhead luggage locker space is definitely at a premium, with only small overhead lockers, which will only fit a bag 53cm x 34cm x 22cm, and that 22cm is crucial: any larger, and it just won't go. Air Southwest baggage limits are even tighter for those in row 6 and row 7, where the wing means that the lockers are a mere 12cm high.

Air Southwest Dash 8 unique rear facing seats

When it comes to cabin comforts, well, there aren't any. The versions of the Dash 8 that Air Southwest have were designed and built before the Q series, for quiet, or cabin noise suppression was introduced. As a result they are very noisy. However they do have a very high aspect ratio wing ratio - and it's mounted high up too. Therefore, there is a great view of the passing Devon and Cornish countryside. All of Air Southwest's Dash 8 are all registered with the suffix G-WOWn, with the WOW supposedly for World Airlines, which was the airline's proposed name at one stage. This shows decidedly lofty ambitions.

All the aircraft are identical, except for G-WOWE, which has tiny tables hidden in the armrests of the forward facing seats of 4. This is actually a huge advantage, because in the other four aircraft you have to ask for a special table to be clipped to the front of the seat, which gives rise to the unique Air Southwest inflight call when the aircraft reaches the cruise of "anyone want any tables?"

Eastern Airways BAe Jetstream 41 at Newquay

Eastern Airways Saab 2000

Eastern Airways, just like Air Southwest, also flies small 50 seater planes, but it has gone down the route of the Saab 2000. It has 8 in the fleet, which it purchased at low cost secondhand from operators that were axeing their fleet after Saab ceased production of the Saab 2000 in 1999.

They are pretty similar to the Dash 8s, with a small 2+2 cabin, however the wings are much lower, spoiling the view.

Eastern Airways BAe Jetstream 41

Just when you thought you couldn't get on a smaller plane - up pops an Eastern Airways British Aerospace Jetstream 41 They are lovely, cute, and very very small. They seat 29.

The fleet of 20 BAe Jetstream 41 aircraft forms the majority of the fleet. Just like Air SouthWest, many of the planes are ex-British Airways, with 12 BAe Jetstream 41 aircraft and their associated routes transferred from British Airways CitiExpress in 2003, which has given Eastern a springboard into many regional UK airports.

The old adage about "if you don't expect much, you'll be pleasantly surprised" is very true about Air Southwest. True, it is a low cost, no-frills carrier, operating the standard buy-on-board service which means you buy your own food, and you can't reserve a seat in advance. However, the friendliness and quirkiness of Air Southwest also means you'll get service above what you expect, even if it is a trifle rough around the edges. As a result of which, Air Southwest reviews are generally positive.

Above all Air Southwest is an airline that does what it says on the tin, and there's no real way of tarting up a basic bus service for those who live in one of the remoter parts of the United Kingdom - although, for the brief six weeks or so of summer, when the old Dash 8s are packed with a totally different type of customer, the service becomes decidedly fruitier, and you don't half wish the Grockles would go back home, and leave the airline to those who know the staff by name.

Checkin Desk London Gatwick

Your Air Southwest experience starts with checkin - which is a pleasant 20 minutes in the main hubs of Plymouth and Newquay, if you're carrying your own bag. The Air Southwest minimum check in time can reduce even more on occasions if you're in a real hurry.

However you'll get a different experience at, say, Gatwick, compared to Newquay. At Gatwick (route currently suspended) Air Southwest have taken over a BA operation, and it shows, from the checkin at a rebadged BA counter, to BA boarding cards, to even using the BA Executive Club lounge (which, incidentally, is the cheapest way of accessing it by a long long way).

Down in Newquay or Plymouth, and you'll see a totally different operation, where not only boarding cards, but the passenger manifest is written out by hand. If you have access to the lounge, a number is written out - sometimes on the back of an old envelope - and you'll be asked to punch it in yourself.

Checkin Desk Newquay

Another quirk of Air Southwest is that on triangular routes, you need to sit on a certain side of the cabin depending on your destination. This is to ensure that everyone who should get off does, and is a unique work around to the problem Air Southwest have with totally incompatible computer systems in London, Devon and Cornwall.

Air Southwest boarding the small Dash 8 cabin

At larger airports such as Gatwick or Manchester, there are often free newspapers on stands at the gates: at Newquay and Plymouth there is nothing, although the crew sometimes pass around The Falmouth Packet or the Cornish Guardian if you're desperate, before the usual run in the rain to the aircraft: Air Southwest aircraft do not call at airbridges.

Once the noisy Air Southwest Dash-8 has lumbered into the air, and every part of the cabin sounds as if it has some permanent rattle, service begins, with just one trolley, from front to back. The in-flight menu - such as it is - is in the seatback. Make sure you have plenty of change (anything over a ten quid note is a bad idea) and several backup plans in case your food of choice has been eaten: there are very few sandwiches on board, so you'll normally be stuck with the cheese plate towards the end of the days rotation. The five quid Deli Deals with a cup of tea, bun and a KitKat go very quickly.

Air Southwest inflight menu

Air Southwest operate a premium service called Advantage, which is in effect Business Class lite. If you're flying in this class, make sure your boarding card is to hand: there is a little sticker in the top right saying Advantage, which gives you a free muffin and a drink (alcohol, but not Sparkling Wine, included).

Inflight Magazine

The Air Southwest inflight magazine is called Enjoy SouthWest, and a pretty thin rag it is too. But then Enjoy SouthWest is actually a magazine designed to be handed out at Tourist Information Centres, Cafés, Bars, and the odd B&B. It's not really an inflight magazine, but Air Southwest carry it anyway, due to the lack of their own publication.

Air Southwestk inflight magazine

If you're a tourist flying down to Cornwall, there are some interesting features, and the pictures are very good indeed, but the constant advertorial and the lack of any real, dare I say it, content for those who live in the region, does mean it feels pretty scrappy, and once it's been kicking around the plane for a couple of months, boy does it start to feel tired, with foxed corners, and scrawl down the margins. It's produced in Worcester, and with a circulation of 20,000 it is actually bigger than you'd imagine.

Luggage allowance

The checked baggage allowance on Air Southwest Flights is actually pretty good compared to most low-cost airlines. You get two bags free! Each passenger may take up to two pieces of normally sized baggage with a combined weight of up to 15kg (33lbs). Total dimensions of each piece of baggage (length + height + width) must not exceed 158cm (62 inches).

If you are travelling in Business Class - called Advantage - the limit is a generous 30kg.

Anything over this is charged, but the cost is not too bad: just 6GBP per kg, or 8 euro from European airports.

Air Southwest hand-baggage allowance is a pretty normal 7kg, and only one piece is permitted, which must be no bigger than 53cm x 34cm x 22cm. A laptop may be carried, but must be contained within the single item of hand-baggage, unless you are flying FROM Plymouth or Manchester, in which case In addition a laptop, in its case, may be carried. As has been noted, there is nothing like Air Southwest for slightly weird rules and exceptions.

Here's a pleasant surprise: Air southwest have Business Class lounges! It's not what you'd expect from a low cost carrier, however Air Southwest still have some hangovers from when it was a British Airways operation, and one of these used to include a full business class called Business Plus. No longer - rises in Air Passenger Duty have put paid to that. Instead there is the new Advantage Class, which gives you access to the lounge. Some lounges are also Priority Pass, and some regular passengers are PP members, just to use the lounge in places like Newquay.

NQY: Newquay Air Southwest Business Class Lounge

Small door beside teabar Open 0530-2200
Access to SZ Advantage passengers, and priority pass.
At the small Cornish hub of Newquay it's a pleasant surprise to find there is a full business class lounge. Technically this lounge is owned and operated by the airport, but pretty much the only passengers to use it are those on Air Southwest and Eastern Airways, except in mid-summer when Lufthansa's business class passengers get the perk too, and for a few hours it becomes the defacto Star Alliance lounge at Newquay.

The lounge is unattended (even though there is a small reception desk) so make sure you ask at checkin for the door code. The four digit code is written down on a small piece of card, and you punch the code into the door. Finding the door is easy: it's at the far side of the main airport waiting lobby, past the small snackbar. If you are Priority Pass, present your credentials before security at the Information Desk to the right of the check-in desks.

Newquay Business Class Lounge

Newquay Business Class Lounge

The Newquay business class lounge is lovely; small, compact, and feeling exclusive, it is the way all business class lounges should be. Plus, it gets hardly any traffic, and so it still has that very new (if slightly broom-cupboard) feel.

There is seating for 24 people, mainly in large squishy brown leather armchairs, although there are also a couple of sofas along the far walls, set around low coffee tables, and with a couple of palm trees in pots to complete that Cornish feeling. Around the walls there are some quite nice photos, most of which have been taken by the airport staff. At the far end is a lovely alcove - and the only window - with just one seat and a coffee table, overlooking the airfield and the two gates. It is by far the best seat in the lounge.

There is one wall-mounted television (which is usually turned off, however it does receive Freeview, and when on it is often on News 24) and a separate flight departure screen, although when a flight departs, there's usually a shout across the inside of the hut (sorry, airport) to hurry people along. There are no showers in the lounge, but there are two unisex toilets, in the corridor in the nearside corner, and a vending machine offering toothbrushes.

Newquay Business Class Lounge

Business facilities are spartan. There are no computers in the lounge, but there are three simple workstations in the far corner, with a net port (bring your own RJ45 cable). There is also free secure wifi in just in the lounge (the code is on a laminated card sitting on one of the tables, although this tends to move around) but it is very slow. Better is the free (unsecure) wifi throughout the whole airport terminal: take your pick, but remember to bring your own laptop. There is no telephone or fax in the lounge, but there is a payphone next to the snackbar outside if you are really desperate (which you may be: mobile reception at NQY is notoriously poor, and good luck finding any 3G).

Air Southwest Newquay Lounge
►More details, larger pictures      and Photo Gallery.

Forget coming to the lounge for food: there really isn't any. However the designers realised that for most English passengers on a short flight, what they really want is some chocolate and several beers. Hence there is a large wicker basket of chocolate bars, and another of crisps. No wonder the staff at the airfield tend to refer to this room as the free sweet shop: Kitkats, Maltesers, Smarties, Maratons, Drifters, and Mars bars: there's enough free sugar on tap to have you running around the terminal. Add to this the crisp basket with Walkers and Doritos, and it actually makes a refreshing change from the usual lounge fare.

Finally, there is a bar, and although this looks poor too, actually it offers some pretty choices. Forget spirits: all the offerings are in the small fridge under the worktop on the left side as you enter. Beer is either Corona, Peroni or Budweiser. Wine is the usual British drinking wine of Jacobs Creek, in white or rose variants, or an anonymous Italian, while red is right on the extreme top of the unit (and rather hard to reach). There are also small bottles of tonic water (but, of course, no gin), and larger bottles of Coke and Fanta, plus banana and chocolate Yazoo milkshakes, and orange and apple juice cartons.

Interestingly, the development of this lounge was paid for via the curious Newquay passenger charge, of �5 levied on all passengers: a curious way of getting economy class passengers to pay for the perks of those up the pointy end.

LGW: London Gatwick Air Southwest Business Class Lounge

North Terminal, after security Open 0515-2230
Access to SZ Advantage passengers. NO access to priority pass.
NEWS: Air Southwest have suspended all flight to Gatwick.

London Gatwick Business Class Lounge

At LGW Air Southwest operate out of the North Terminal, and use the BA lounges. The lounge complex is on the extreem left of the Terminal as you walk in, past the shopping area, however it is only an old-style Terrages. The lounge itself is big, and has all the perks you'd expect of from BA. The World Wine Bars, is highly recommended with 6 white and 6 red wines, while in the fridges under the counter are cans of Stella, Grolsh, Newcastle Brown Ale, and Guinness, plus plenty of soft drinks and bottles of water.

Food isn't quite as good with just biscuits, packets of Walker's Fruit Cake, nuts, olives, and two types of cheese (cheddar and Leicester) with three types of cheese crackers. In the evening there are some sandwiches although they tend to disappear very quickly. Dotted around the lounge are strands with newspapers - there is normally a selection of each of the main UK papers. At the far end is a very small business centre with five computers. There is a shower suite of three showers available.

Full details of this lounge are contained in the BA pages, under the Gatwick lounge section.

MAN: Manchester Air Southwest Busines Class Lounge

Manchester Business Class Lounge

Terminal 3, up stairs near central rotundra Open 0500-2000
Access to SZ Advantage passengers. NO access to priority pass.
Just as at Gatwick, Air Southwest borrow the British Airways lounge at Manchester. After you walk up the stairs from the main waiting hall below, the main feature strikes you - the huge circular central rotundra, around which the lounge is based.

There is the usual World Wine Bar with 4 whites, 4 reds, all the usual beers, and a special treat: Boddingtons - the Cream of Manchester. Food has slices of shortbread, plus breakfast (to 1130) and sandwiches (12-2, and 5-7pm) but these are very plain ham or cheese. There are chunks of cheddar in the fridge at all times.

There are several newspaper racks in the lounge, with a full selection of all the UK dailies, however despite the appearance of a library, there are no magazines.

Full details of this lounge are contained in the British Airways Manchester lounge section.

NEWS: Air Southwest have suspended all flights to Gatwick, and now no longer have any routes to the capital from Cornwall or Devon. Flybe now operate on this route. The airline will now be using these aircraft on an intense twice-daily service from Newquay to Aberdeen.

Air Southwest is the home of Triangular routes: be aware that your flight may stop off along the way to pick up some more passengers, get to your destination with those passengers on board, and then drop some more off before getting back where you started too. There are also milk-run routes, that stop off at, well, quite a lot of places really.

Air Southwest a run over the tarmac to board the Dash 8 at Gatwick

This all leads to a nightmare of organisation, with computer systems at some airports not talking to others. AirSouthwest have found a unique way of getting around this: passgengers for a half-way destination sit on one side of the cabin, and for another place, on another side. It's then easy to check everyone's got off. Mind you, checkin varies enormously too, from the full BA experience (and BA boarding cards) at Gatwick, to the handwritten manifest and boarding cards on a quiet day at Newquay.

London: Air Southwest have now axed the Plymouth-Newquay-London Gatwick-Plymouth triangular route, after many years of operating this three times a day (four in summer).

The aircraft spared from the Gatwick route are now to be used on an unusual and speculative flight to Aberdeen, via Leeds/Bradford, twice a day, leaving Newquay at 0630 and 1555 every day.

The UK's longest "milkrun" flight used to be operated by Air Southwest, running Jersey-Plymouth-Bristol-Manchester, however now there is a triangular route Plymouth-Jersey-Guernsey-Plymouth leaving at 1120, getting to Jersey, and completing the return at 1225 daily (1135 at weekends).

Route Map Air Southwest core triangular routes

Airline schedules change regularly

This information is intended as a guide, but for up to the minute timetables, please consult Air Southwest at airsouthwest.com.

Other milkrun routes include Plymouth-Newquay-Glasgow-Newquay-Plymouth, Plymouth-Newquay-Dublin-Plymouth, Plymouth-Newquay-Cork-Plymouth, Plymouth-Bristol-Manchester-Plymouth (if you take the afternoon flight it avoids the stopover) and Plymouth-Bristol-Leeds Bradford-Bristol-Plymouth (although some days it avoid the Bristol stopoff, either on the way up, or the way down).

Incidentally, a Milkrun Flight is the common term used to denote a flight that stops off at several places along the way to drop off or pick up passengers, while a triangular route means a flight that is a milk run, but which only stops off in two places, before returning to its destination.

NEWS: Air Southwest has now been sold to Eastern Airlines.

Air Southwest was created in October 2003 by Sutton Harbour Holdings (which also owns Plymouth City Airport) when British Airways realised there was little money in flying to the West Country from London (at one stage it flew from Heathrow to Newquay, although that flight was moved to Gatwick in 2000). Air Southwest took over operations from BA the day it left the market, using their planes, crew, and equipment. For quite some time, planes few in BA colours, flying the Plymouth-Newquay-London Gatwick-Plymouth triangular route. It quickly took over the Plymouth-Bristol-Manchester route as well, extending it to Jersey as the UK's longest "milkrun".

Air Southwest Dash 8 at Newquay

Removing BA's large cost base gave the airline success with these routes, so it decided to try some other connections, flying from Newquay-Bristol-Leeds-Bradford, Newquay-Cardiff-Manchester (later routed via Bristol, and Cardiff was abandoned in 2007), and the first international route, to Dublin. However an experiment in 2007 from Bristol to Norwich was rapidly abandoned.

Eastern Airways BAe Jetstream 41 at Newquay

By 2006 the three daily flights from Newquay to Gatwick has expanded to five, and in 2007 Newquay was firmly established as the hub, with flights to Grenoble, Cork, Glasgow and Newcastle. In 2009 Plymouth-Guernsey was added. London City Airport even got a brief service in the summer of 2009 from Plymouth & Newquay.

However, with all this expansion, Newquay came within the sights of other airlines. Initially Ryanair had a go, flying 737s from Stansted which dwarfed Newquay (they abandoned the route in 2009), then BA had another go at taking over the route it had abandoned: this only lasted a year. Flybe got in on the act, and started offering very low fares from Gatwick to Newquay, with which Air Southwest couldn't compete, although with a far less regular or convenient service.

All this took place at a time of major changes for the airline. In May 2010 Sutton Harbour Holdings, sold Air South West Ltd to what was actually a smaller competitor, Eastern Airways, in December 2010.

The first major decision of the new owners was to pull what was the main trunk route from the West Country to London Gatwick on the February 1st 2011, bringing a sad end to a service that had been its mainstay for many years. The airline then transfered these aircraft onto an unusual route from Newquay to Aberdeen.

Air Southwest Business Class

It may sound mad, but seriously consider flying business class on Air Southwest.

Air Southwest Advantage Class offers some distinct benefits, including lounge access, free food on board, and more luggage. If you book at the last minute, the cost of this class is only six pounds more than full economy - and definitely worth it. You gain Business lounge access, free on-board refreshments (one alcoholic drink and one sandwich), and an increased baggage allowance of 30 kg, plus free changes to booking up to two hours before flight departure, and fast track security at Gatwick.

Air Southwest Dash 8 on a stormy day at Newquay

Considering the short duration of most Air Southwest flights, it may seem pretty pointless buying up to another class - but if the difference in fare is less than a tenner, add up the price of two beers at the airport, and if you have a lot of luggage, then the extra 15kg of baggage allowance would cost you nearly 90 quid at checkin - so it may well be worth it, and you'll be quids (as well as beers) in.

Air Southwest Website

Just like the airline, Air Southwest's website is pretty basic, but it does a good solid job of achieving just what it says it should do: in this case sell you tickets. Now over 90% of passengers book online.

The booking engine is pretty simple, but gets results across well. It automatically shows you flights the day before and after your selected day, indicated where your flight will stop off en-route (which is very common with most Air Southwest flights) and immediately shows the difference in price between basic economy and business class.

Website: www.airsouthwest.com
Timetable: airsouthwest.com/flights
Business Class: airsouthwest.com/advantage
News & Press Releases: airsouthwest.com/flights

Air Southwest operate the typical buy on board system of most low-cost airlines, unless you are an Advantage customer, in which case you get one free snack, and one free drink (which can be alcoholic).

Prices are pretty reasonable, with a Cup-a-Soup coming in at £1.50, Pringles are £1.20, a Muffin at £1.60, while the five quid Deli Deals with a cup of tea, bun and a KitKat go very quickly at £5.00 (the roll just by itself is £3.60).

Cheese & Pate Snack Pack

A mini tub of LaVache Quirit Laughing Cow processed cheese. A tub of Carrs Farmhouse Pate.

Two Carr's Table Water Crackers. Two Jacobs Bran Table Crackers. A packet of pretzels.

Ah, the height of sophistication on Air Southwest. Ish. Certainly this surpasses anything you are likely to get on most low-cost airlines, but it's not really Cornish is it?

Decent Pate though, and the cheese isn't bad, and not too pricey either. £2.00

Ginster's Cornish Pasty

A traditional Cornish Pasty.

Ah, good real honest cornish food, all the way from Callington.

A great Ginsterspasty, with a light delicate pastry case that keeps the meat and vegetables clean, whilst helping to retain the distinctive flavour. £3.60

Air Southwest operate the typical buy on board system of most low-cost airlines, unless you are an Advantage customer, in which case you get one free snack, and one free drink (which can be alcoholic).

Prices are a little high, with tea a whopping £1.70, as is the coffee or hot chocolate.

The bar has beer (Stella) at £2.50, but spirits at £3.50, wine at £3.30 and Sparkling Wine a pricey £9.00.

White Wine: Jacob's Creek Semillon Chardonnay

This is a classic Aussie Battler.

The Jacob's Creek Semillon Chardonnay is a light to medium-bodied Semillon and Chardonnay blend boasts ripe melon, nectarine and fresh citrus flavours with a soft smooth finish. 12.5% £3.30

Red Wine: Dudleys Stone Cabernet Merlot

This is a very good South African red, from the Western Cape.

Originally of French origins, this versatile grape produces exceptional wines in South Africa. It's full bodied with a fine structure that supports black and red fruit flavors with typical notes of olive, chili and herbs that add complexity. On the whole, pretty good! 13% £3.30