Those who have flown the Atlantic on Aer Lingus for more than just a few years need not be told that the business of ferrying people across an ocean is an up and down one. And in more ways than just take offs and landings.
Veteran transatlantic flyers variously remember a time when flying was a highlight of a lifetime, an experience to be bottled up in the memory along with little souvenirs like wings, decks of cards and napkins with airline insignia.
In more recent times, though not in recent years, there was the prospect of being loaded on a Jumbo Jet and rattling across the Atlantic with seats to spare forward, aft and on either side.
In more recent years, you might have been hard put to find a seat at all amid the hordes of Irish visitors and shoppers, some of whom had turned the Atlantic crossing into a latter day Viking raid in which the department stores of Manhattan were the object of plunder and quick escape back eastwards by dint of a late evening return flight after a lunchtime arrival.
In recent years, Aer Lingus, and the likes of Delta and Continental, benefited greatly from this Irish largesse and hunger for designer products at U.S. prices.
The old balance of numbers was tipped as a result. Business over the Atlantic did not depend nearly so much on Americans paying once-in-a-lifetime visits to the old country.
Rather, shoppers, business travelers and Irish tourists were scooping up seats in much the same way they scooped up cars and property.
This, as we are all too acutely aware, is no longer the case and those who have a few years flying under their belts will now be having d