N811NW, PH-KCF in medical diversions

Today's Northwest Airlines flight NWA 811 operating from London Gatwick to Atlanta diverted to Shannon when a male passenger fell ill. The aircraft was west of Ireland when the aircraft turned back and landed on Shannon's R06 at 10.32 utc. Unfortunately the passenger was pronounced dead on arrival at the airport, having suffered a suspected heart attack. The body was taken to the Mid Western Regional Hospital in Limerick. The flight departed Shannon again at 12:42 utc.

N811NW was a recent visitor to Shannon prior to today's diversion. The aircraft performed a technical diversion on June 12 when smoke was noted in the cabin by a crew member.

At the same time as the Northwest Airlines flight was diverting to Shannon, flight KLM 758, routing from Panama City to Amsterdam was forced to divert to Cork, also with a medical emergency. The flight operated by MD11, registration PH-KCF landed a few moments after the NWA flight landed in Shannon. The passenger on the KLM flight who had also suffered a suspected heart attack was taken by ambulance to Cork University Hospital. Flight KLM 758 departed Cork again at 11.35 utc. Shannon is the preferred diversion airport for technical and medical emergencies but since Shannon was tied up with the NWA flight the KLM flight was directed to Cork.

Pictured above in the copyright picture by Paul Daly, PH-KCF is seen on departure from Cork at 11.35 utc

UPS withdraw from Cork

UPS have confirmed that from Friday all export freight from the Cork area will be flown out of the company's existing bases at Shannon and Dublin. All other operations at Cork will continue as normal. The company is not planning redundancies in Cork at this time.

Cork achieves passenger record for 2008

Cork Airport set a new record in 2008 with 3.25m passengers using the facility. The figure represents a 2.5% increase over 2007 and brought an additional 80,000 passengers through Cork during the year.

London traffic grew 4% to 927,000 with provincial UK airport traffic growing 26% to 669,000. Continental European passenger numbers were static over 2007 at 869,000.

Domestic traffic suffered a 10% decline to 443,00 passengers during the year.