Malta Luqa LMML

It is not a big deal if large airports charge big money if there are suitable GA alternatives.

However, Malta is the very example of one where there is NO alternative in the whole COUNTRY. So if they do these “stay away” charges, they have to be aware that most of small GA will avoid the country as a whole.

I recall when Greece was the same but then introduced special fees for AOPA members. Maybe someone should talk to the handling agents down there about that, as it appears to be them who are the only ones who can budge on this.

Mooney_Driver wrote:

Maybe someone should talk to the handling agents down there about that, as it appears to be them who are the only ones who can budge on this.

You could try but I don’t think it will change a lot. Malta is a very remote destination for small GA and if they attract three times as much planes by cutting down their fees to one third, they will make exactly as much money than before – only with three times as much work. Why should they do that?

Th clue is in the fact they operate an arrival slot allocation system. Malta doesn’t need GA.

What work exactly are the handling agents doing for a small piston aircraft? 3 times zero work is still zero work.

The AIRPORT has a slot system – nothing to do with handlers. Let me give an example:

In our calibration role we would ordinarily expect to take about 1:15 to 1:30 to calibrate a single ILS. At Luqa I’ve spent 6hrs doing an ILS and four days completing a task which ordinarily takes a little over a day. The airport and the island doesn’t need more movements and, if it did, I’m sure it would prefer an A320 over a TB20.

alioth wrote:

What work exactly are the handling agents doing for a small piston aircraft? 3 times zero work is still zero work.

I would want them to dispose of my Rest Stop bag for sure.

Ok so Malta is off the grid. Im sure there are other locations that are interesting to fly to here in Europe.

Why dont you take the cheaper one? Does the other serve you champagne like in Potorse on arrival?

Flew into Teterboro in the states and stopped by Millionaire. The line boy came out and threw down a red carpet at the door of the plane. We asked if there was an extra charge and the answer was “no. All you have to do is buy 40gal of gas.” No handling charges either. So I disposed of the reststop bag myself.

What work exactly are the handling agents doing for a small piston aircraft? 3 times zero work is still zero work.

The excellent service we got there with a piston twin. Why should they treat a piston single less well?

Emir wrote:

I have two offers: €150 from Aviaserve and €125 from Air Malta.

It was the same for me. But I had already confirmed with Aviaserve. Try Air Malta and give us a feedback :-).
I wanted to contact the Flying club, but I do not have time…