De-icing

Airline Services fulfils a critical requirement in aviation’s service industry – the universal need of all operators for a reliable and professional aircraft de-icing provider.

Our success in this field is unparalleled and we are now the UK’s largest independent de-icing provider, serving more than one hundred domestic and international carriers across nine of the country’s major airports.

Airline Services' Rigs

The secret of our success is simple and is based on an on-going training and equipment investment programme that is second to none and which allows us to guarantee our customers the best de-icing equipment, infrastructure and dedicated manpower available anywhere in the UK today.

De-icing at Manchester Airport

We operate a fleet of forty eight de-icing rigs, all of which are of the most modern design and are of a size and specification ideally suited to their location. Critically, too, every one of our rigs is capable of anti-icing as well as de-icing.

Our operation is based on the bulk storage of mixed fluid, maintained at optimum temperature, for immediate use.

Because the fluid is heated by conduction externally it is not subjected to the detrimental on board mixing/heating/cooling cycle suffered in traditional operations. This and the fact that fluid pumping is kept to a minimum means that the time old problem of fluid degradation is non existent.

Put simply, the integrity of the fluid used in every Airline Services’ operation is guaranteed, every time.

We have a team of more than 130 experienced de-icing operators, each of whom has undergone extensive practical and theory training before progressing to "live " aircraft. To ensure consistency, each operator is trained by our dedicated Technical Manager who, it may be of interest to know sits on the EASA Ground De-icing Steering Group and is a founder member of the CAA Ground De-icing Steering Group.

In line with our De-icing Procedure every operator is retrained and reassessed to the same exacting standards prior to the start of each season.

Operator training & assessment

Importantly, to our knowledge, Airline Services is also the only provider actively campaigning for de-icing to be made a regulated industry and as such, accountable to the CAA. We believe that this is the only way a carrier can be assured that the standard we have set in the provision of service is matched by every supplier in the industry.

This approach ensures that the highest levels of service are maintained throughout our operation.

Our customers’ experience bears this out and it goes without saying that we are happy to support our claims to excellence with Service Level Agreements based on on-time departure, should that be a requirement.

If you would like to discuss de-icing provision with us further or indeed you are interested in a proposal for service we would be delighted to hear from you at any time.