By the end of the 1980s Air Micronesia was going from strength to strength, whereas its shareholder and partner Continental was struggling with the Texas Air ownership and the amalgamation of PeoplExpress, Frontier, PBA and assets from Eastern. Briefly it looked like Continental's influence would wane, but eventually as CO recovered the whole organisation was rebranded and gradually grew closer to the mainline operation.
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The sheer size of the Pacific Ocean has made air travel both a necessity and a significant challenge. In the immediate postwar years the USA gained effective control of a huge area of it - dotted with a large number of islands and remote communities. After a couple of initial attempts it would be third time lucky as Air Micronesia came into being, under the stewardship of Bob Six's Continental, to create an airline to serve and help develop Micronesia - then known as the Trust Territory of the Pacific Islands.
I last wrote about HK Express back in May 2017, but since then the world has changed. Hong Kong's airlines suffered especially badly from the Pandemic, with the extended late Chinese lockdowns, but even prior to that travails of the HNA group and unrest in Hong Kong itself caused issues. Now under new ownership the airline is bigger and more profitable than ever, plus in January 2023 it unveiled a new branding as well.
Even though East Germany was an important member of the Warsaw Pact it's national airline, Interflug, never operated the Tu-154 trijet, basing its jet fleet around the smaller Tu-134 and larger Il-62 instead. That doesn't mean a couple of 154s didn't wear the Interflug scheme though, and these aircraft would serve beyond the German reunification with one being involved in a tragic mid-air collision.
I generally try and avoid Bluebox / Jet-X Tristars but some of them are just so unusual that they are hard to turn down. This model was part of a big box of fabulous obscure models (mainly 10 IL-76s but also Vanguards and others) that arrived late last week. I'm gradually getting sucked in to these types of unusual model offerings and it is somewhat surprising to see that Jet-X was putting this sort of effort in, and doing such a good job too. But, just what is an L-1011 doing with a rocket strapped to its belly?
Deregulation of the US aviation market wasn't kind to the local service airlines. They faced being gobbled up by rampant former trunk airlines or kamikaze low fare competition from a host of new startups. Frontier Airlines was in a more difficult position than most and attempted to buttress itself with a low-cost offshoot of its own. Sadly, this only served to strain relations with its own employees and fell short of the hopes that it could stabilise the failing airline.
The advent of low cost carriers led to a raft of legacy airlines setting up low cost subsidiaries across the globe. From New Zealand to Germany, and South Africa to the USA the established airlines were on the defensive. Canada was no different, and faced with the challenge of WestJet, Air Canada decided it too would jump on the bandwagon, at least until it could get its own cost's under control. The result was ZIP!
Collecting model airliners can give you a window into other cultures, which can sometimes seem bizarre by Western standards. Chinese airlines have a wide variety of interesting special schemes, often based upon the destinations they come from or serve. Air Travel is one of China's smaller airlines but has painted one of its new A320neos in a firey scheme, paying homage to its home province of Hunan and the women that reside there.
If the Convair 240 ensured TAA was able to survive its formative years the Vickers Viscount proved more than capable of finally allowing it to consistently return a profit and outcompete its longtime opponent ANA. Indeed ANA's failure to also buy Viscounts would prove to be terminal and lead indirectly to TAA facing a stronger competitive force in that of Reginald Ansett's Ansett Airways.
Trans Australia Airlines (TAA) had from its creation been the trendsetter in the Australian market, introducing Convair 240s which enabled it to survive its formative rocky years. It was no surprise then that it took an early interest in turboprops and in particular the new Vickers Viscount. In 1949 TAA personnel had visited the annual display and exhibition of the Society of British Aircraft Constructors and identified the Viscount as 'considerably superior to anything else in its class'.
Following the breakup of the USSR various Aeroflot directorates gained their independence and spawned a wide variety of successor airlines, both inside Russia and within the newly independent republics. Kaliningrad found itself in an in-between space whereby it no longer bordered Russia but was still part of it. This enabled opportunity but also risk, which eventually didn't pay off for the Oblast's airline KD Avia.
Nowadays Virgin Atlantic seems like part of the aviation establishment, having cemented its place at Heathrow, become part-owned by Delta and joined the Skyteam alliance. That wasn't always the case and given the anti-competitive nature of flying across the pond in the 1980s it is a massive achievement that it survived into the 90s at all.
Managing the seasonal nature of the charter airline business has historically led to several airlines switching capacity across the Atlantic in the Winter with lease agreements whereby their aircraft get a winter in North America and a summer back in the UK. Air Europe had such an agreement with Air Florida between 1980/81 and 1982/83 but the failure of the American airline led to a more unusual arrangement with the British flag carrier that not only saw Air Europe swap aircraft but also acquire its first 757s from British Airways order backlog.
Following Canadian's takeover of Wardair in 1989 Canada 3000 would quickly grow to become Canada's largest charter airline and one that was consistently profitable too. At the turn of the century the massive changes wrought by the takeover of Canadian Airlines by Air Canada appeared to open up a space for C3 to become Canada's no 2 airline and part of that strategy involved acquisitions. However, C3 would soon live to regret its purchases and desperately try to offload them as it hit the turbulence of 2001.
Compass Airlines was the first attempt to compete against the duopoly of Ansett and Australian Airlines when market deregulation finally came about in November 1990. It was doomed to fail, but did become the only airline operator of VH registered A300-600s - and oddly a single Airbus A310 too.
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AuthorI'm Richard Stretton: a fan of classic airliners and airlines who enjoys exploring their history through my collection of die-cast airliners. If you enjoy the site please donate whatever you can to help keep it running: Archives
September 2024
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