Ryanair called on the Board and Management of Aer Lingus to explain why Aer Lingus is wet leasing 4 of its larger A320 aircraft to Virgin to operate routes to/from Heathrow which have no connection with or value to Ireland. Where will these 4 aircraft come from? Will they be taken from Aer Lingus' existing bases at Shannon, Cork or Dublin? Will this result in yet another decline in Aer Lingus' traffic, which has already fallen from 10.4m in 2009 to 9.5m in 2011? Will Aer Lingus' contribution to Ireland's "Grabbing" in 2013 be yet another 1m cut in capacity and traffic to/from the Republic of Ireland? Ryanair's Stephen McNamara said: "In 2010 Aer Lingus was promising that the United Airlines wet lease "partnership" would be the way forward, yet 2 years later United abruptly cancelled the deal and returned the aircraft to Aer Lingus. Instead, United have now entered the Washington-Dublin route, which Aer Lingus previously withdrew from.