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Best name forgotten(Newsletter Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge) PILOTS flying into the George Best Belfast City Airport are to be reminded just where they are headed " with a number yet to twig on to the name change. Over two months since the Province's second airport was officially renamed after the Belfast Boy, it appears that old habits die hard in the air. A spot check by the News Letter found five out of five pilots on consecutive flights arriving at the airport had failed to welcome passengers to the "George Best Belfast City Airport''. Despite the fact that they had just had to endure a long haul flight from Sydney, Newtownabbey couple James and Georgina Luke didn't fail to notice that the pilot flying their British Airways plane from Manchester didn't namecheck the Cregagh-born football superstar. "He definitely didn't refer to it as the George Best Belfast City Airport. "It's right that this is how it's known because it's been officially renamed in his honour,'' said Georgina. Newcastle man Michael O'Hare, 46, who is a regular visitor to Northern Ireland, also noticed the gaff on the Flybe flight he had taken from his home city. "I fly from Newcastle to Belfast quite regularly and I don't think I've ever heard it called the George Best Belfast City Airport " just Belfast City Airport.'' The pilot of another Flybe flight, this time from Liverpool and the next to arrive at George Best Belfast City Airport, also turned the clock back to before May 22, 2006. Eddie and Sandra Wilson, from the Wirral, who were coming to Belfast to visit their son, who lives in Holywood, bore witness to the fact that George Best's memory was also snubbed on this flight. The pilots of aircraft from Birmingham and Heathrow, Flybe and BMI respectively, similarly failed to namecheck George Best. Belfast singer Conor McCullagh, 23, who was on the aforementioned London flight, thought it ''disappointing'' that pilots were failing to pay tribute in the air to someone who had helped put his home town on the map. In response to fact that one of their pilots hadn't appeared to have updated his book of airport names, a British Airways spokeswoman said: ''All our staff have been briefed that the airport's name has changed to the George Best Belfast City Airport and this is how they should refer to it. We hope this is a one-off.'' BMI released a statement which was the same as British Airways, while a Flybe spokeswoman, commenting on a trio of pilots who appear to have done likewise, said: "Our crew announcements are reviewed quarterly at headquarters in Exeter and it would appear that the renaming of the airport occurred prior to the last review. "This will be rectified in the next review which is scheduled to take place early next month and it is intended that the full title the George Best Belfast City Airport will from then on be incorporated in all crew announcements.'' George Best Belfast City Airport was unable to put forward a spokesman. |