BOSSES at Bristol International Airport say they are 'saddened' and 'disappointed' at an airline's decision to cut services in and out of the site, which will mean the loss of jobs. Following the sale of British Airways Connect, which operates nine routes

BOSSES at Bristol International Airport say they are 'saddened' and 'disappointed' at an airline's decision to cut services in and out of the site, which will mean the loss of jobs.Following the sale of British Airways Connect, which operates nine routes in and out of BIA, new owner Flybe has announced it will not continue to run current flights from Bristol to Milan, Zurich and Munich after March 25. The announcement could mean the loss of over 60 jobs.The sale to the low-cost operator was prompted by BA Connect's £6million loss in the first half of the 2006-07 financial year.Tony Hallwood, aviation development director at BIA said: "We are disappointed at Flybe's announcement to terminate BA Connect's operations at the airport from March 25, following its acquisition of the airline. We understand this decision has not been made due to a lack of demand on the routes served by BA Connect, but is rather a decision resulting from the merger of its services. "We are saddened that this news will now result in a loss of a number of BA Connect jobs at the airport and the withdrawal of some scheduled service destinations. "We are confident we will be in a position to announce positive news on a number of the routes affected by Flybe's decision in the near future. "We can confirm that the BA service to Tenerife and the Flybe service to Jersey will remain unaffected. "Bristol International will be making further announcements regarding replacement services and the ongoing development of our domestic and international route network in the near future."Weston MP, John Penrose, is asking for an urgent briefing on redundancy plans following the announcement by Flybe. He said: "I am very concerned about the impact of this decision on Weston. "The routes will be gone before the end of the month and the most important thing now is to keep any potential job losses to an absolute minimum. "I will be contacting Flybe for a briefing on the impact of redundancies on the local community. As I understand it, there will be over 60 ground services posts lost, on top of the redeployment of pilots, engineers and cabin crew to other locations."This is bad news for our regional aviation industry.