bmi insists on a move on time

bmi says that it will strongly resist any bid to delay Star Alliance's long-anticipated move into London Heathrow's Terminal 1. The on-going catastrophic operational problems with British Airways' disastrous first few days in its new home of Terminal 5 have engendered widespread speculation that BA may be forced to delay shifting many long-haul services from T3 and T4.

bmi's concerns are just one facet of the enormous snowball effect caused by the severe problems with T5 that saw BA cancel hundreds of flights and stockpile a reported 28,000 bags. United Airlines and Air New Zealand are due to arrive in T1 by 10 June as part of a complicated jigsaw arrangement that will also see fellow Star members Lufthansa, Swiss and TAP Portugal share the terminal in the 'under one roof' concept.

bmi is due to take over BA's business class lounge as well as cooperate with alliance carriers in developing a new Star arrivals and departures lounge later in the year.