NEARLY 50 more jobs will be axed at Gatwick after Continental Airlines announced plans to pull out.
Bosses at Continental, the world's fifth biggest airline, claimed 'customer preference' and 'hostile' trading conditions meant it had to shift all of its New York flights to Heathrow.
But the loss of 44 jobs will come as a sucker punch to the to
wn – already reeling from the apparent collapse of Zoom, funding talks at XL Leisure, cutbacks at Servisair and the closure of Aviance's Gatwick operation.
Nick Britton, a spokesman for the air operator confirmed that all of their transatlantic flights would operate from Heathrow starting in October this year.
He added: "There will job losses as a result of this move.
"We will lose 44 positions at Gatwick. They are a mix of full time and part time positions.
"With immediate affect we are entering into consultations with our Gatwick employees to offer them alternatives to involuntary redundancy – this includes a voluntary redundancy package and helping them to identify other jobs."
The Continental spokesman blamed the 'change of focus' on a 'combination of factors' including government policy allowing them to operate from Heathrow and the nose-diving economy.
He added: "It is a combination of things. Because of the Open Skies policy we have been able to start a service in March this year at London Heathrow.
"Until that time we had not been able to operate there.
"But since we have been servicing both airports, our customers have shown a clear preference towards Heathrow over Gatwick and our main competitors have focused their operations there.
"Of course we also have to deal with record high fuel costs."
The company, who are also based in Houston, Texas, were forced to axe 3,000 positions from their American operation.
Cllr Claire Denman, cabinet member for planning and economic development said: "From my perspective, we have as a council for a long time tried to make sure that we're not fully dependent on the airport as aviation can be susceptible to down turns.
"We have known for a while that aviation has ups and downs and that our economy has to be diverse.
"This is why the town centre north development, which will bring around 3,000 jobs by completion is so important to Crawley."
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