Fleet Care Program at Cannes-Mandelieu Airport (LFMD)

Who is the Fleet Care Program built for at Cannes-Mandelieu?

This program suits flight departments and charter operators with one or more aircraft spending the season—or the year—on the French Riviera. If you run a super-midsize or larger jet out of Cannes-Mandelieu, turning multiple legs each week during the high season, you need predictable appearance support without negotiating every visit. FBOs managing client fleets on the apron also use the program to keep their line tidy and their clients satisfied.

We work inside your ops rhythm: a quick exterior rinseless wash and cabin tidy between morning and afternoon legs, a full interior detail on a free Tuesday, a single-stage polish in October before the aircraft repositions. The twelve-month calendar means your crew know when we arrive, what we will do, and that the invoice is already accounted for. Quarterly reviews with your operations team let us adjust the plan if your schedule shifts or if Mediterranean salt haze has been heavier than usual.

What does the service calendar include across twelve months?

We build the calendar in the first week, mapping scheduled quick turns, monthly interiors and seasonal exteriors against your flight plan and any known events. Quick turns—dry wash or rinseless exterior, cabin vacuum, galley wipe, lav service—slot between legs when the aircraft has a two- or three-hour gap on the ramp. Monthly interiors rotate through galley deep clean, carpet extraction, leather conditioning and sidewall wipe-down, typically on a day the aircraft is not flying. Seasonal exteriors—full wash, single-stage polish, brightwork restoration—happen twice or three times across the year, depending on how much the aircraft flies and how much salt and dust it collects.

Brightwork oxidises quickly in the coastal climate here; we schedule nacelle and leading-edge polish before summer and again in autumn. Every visit generates a dated photo report and a service-history entry, so your tech log and your own records stay complete. If an AOG request arrives between scheduled visits—bird strike, hydraulic stain, cabin spill before a charter leg—the program gives you priority crew allocation and a faster response than ad-hoc customers receive.

What changes at Cannes-Mandelieu Airport that affect the program?

Cannes-Mandelieu sits five kilometres west of Cannes city centre and is France's second-busiest business-aviation airport, dedicated entirely to general and business aviation. The single business-aviation terminal is served by handling agents present at the airport; Sky Valet Cannes operates from the Cannes Mandelieu business-aviation terminal. The airport offers more than 20,000 square metres of hangar space, useful for winter storage or for interior work when the mistral blows through.

Operating hours are daytime only and seasonal: 08:00–20:00 from 1 January to 8 March and 19 October to 31 December; 08:00–21:00 from 9 March to 3 May and 24 August to 18 October; 08:00–22:00 from 4 May to 23 August, all local time. The airport closes at night with no extensions or overtime, so every turnaround must finish before curfew. Runway 17/35 is the primary hard surface; runway 04/22 is a 760-metre grass strip used by light aircraft. MTOW is limited to 35 tonnes for jets and 22 tonnes for turboprops, so ultra-long-range and heavy jets must use Nice instead.

The airport is slot-coordinated. During the Cannes Film Festival—mid-May, for example 12–23 May 2026—and the Monaco Grand Prix, slot and PPR are issued together by the CDM coordinator, with the number placed in FPL item 18; parking is restricted and no overtime is permitted. A mandatory pilot briefing applies before landing. The Fleet Care Program calendar accounts for these constraints: we schedule work inside daytime hours, avoid the festival and Grand Prix peaks when your aircraft may be parked off-site, and keep every visit within the slot and curfew window.

How do documentation and photo reports work inside the program?

Every visit generates a timestamped photo report: before shots on arrival, detail images during the work, after shots before crew return. We photograph the cheat line, belly, gear bays, nacelles, cabin high-touch areas, galley, lav, and any area that received special attention—oxidation removal on winglets, stain treatment on carpet, leather repair on a divan. The report goes to your operations team by email within two hours of completion, and we keep a twelve-month archive you can request at any time.

Service history entries note the date, the work performed, products used, and any findings—paint chips, hydraulic weeps, cabin wear—that you may want to address during scheduled maintenance. If you need records for an audit, a pre-purchase inspection, or a new charter certificate, the documentation is already organised. Some clients add the photo reports to their own digital maintenance logs; others use them to show owners that the aircraft is being cared for while it sits on the Riviera for the season.

What does the coastal climate do to the aircraft between visits?

Salt haze from the Mediterranean, dust from the hills behind Cannes, and intense ultraviolet in summer all degrade paint, brightwork and cabin materials faster than in a continental or northern climate. Aluminium leading edges and nacelles oxidise within weeks if not protected. Paint loses gloss, and hydrophobic coatings break down under constant sun. Inside the cabin, leather dries and cracks, sidewall fabric fades near windows, and galley surfaces show water spots from the local supply.

The Fleet Care Program spaces visits to catch these problems early: a monthly interior keeps leather conditioned and prevents cracking; seasonal exteriors restore gloss and reapply hydrophobic protection before the paint dulls; brightwork polish every six months stops oxidation from etching into the aluminium. We adjust the calendar if your aircraft spends July and August flying every day—more quick turns, fewer deep cleans—or if it sits on the apron for two weeks in February, when a single wash and cabin airing may be enough.

How does airside access and timing work for scheduled visits?

We hold permanent airside passes for Cannes-Mandelieu and coordinate every visit with your handler and the apron controller. For quick turns, we arrive thirty minutes before block-in, so the aircraft is clean and ready when the next passengers board. For monthly interiors and seasonal exteriors, we agree a stand or hangar slot with the handler the day before, and we work around GPU and ground-service schedules to avoid delays.

If the aircraft is cold-soaked after a morning flight and needs to warm before we open cabin doors, we wait. If a slot change moves your departure two hours earlier, we start earlier or trim the scope to fit the window. The twelve-month calendar gives us and your handler visibility, so equipment, water and crew are pre-positioned. During the Cannes Film Festival and Monaco Grand Prix, when parking is restricted and no overtime is allowed, we schedule work outside those peak windows or arrange hangar access through the airport's offered space to keep the program on track.