Coast Air

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Coast Air

IATA BX	ICAO CST	Callsign Coast Centre
Founded		1986
Hubs		Haugesund Airport, Karmøy
Fleet size		10
Destinations		11
Parent company		TS Industri Invest
Headquarters		Karmøy, Norway
Key people		Trygve Seglem (owner)
Website: http://www.coastair.no

Coast Air is a regional airline based in Avaldsnes, near Haugesund, Norway. It is Norway's fourth largest airline and operates domestic services within Norway and flies charters to the United Kingdom. Its main base is Haugesund Airport, Karmøy.

In addition to operations on the west coast, the airline has three public service obligation contracts with the Norwegian government, flying Oslo-Røros, Oslo-Fagernes and Bodø-Andenes-Tromsø. The airline has also started an international route Sandefjord-Stockholm.

1 History
2 Coast Air Services
3 Fleet
4 External links
5 References

[edit] History

The company started operations in 1986 as Coast Aero Center at Haugesund Airport. In the early years the airline operated Piper PA-31 Navajo and De Havilland Canada Twin Otters. In 1993 it received its first Jetstream 31.

In 1999 the airline won a public service obligation contract with the Norwegian government on the route Oslo-Florø-Bergen, with operations starting April 1, 2000 with an ATR-42-300; for the first time another airline than Widerøe flew on the contracted regional network in Norway. But three years later the airline lost the contract to Danish Air Transport, but won the contract Oslo-Fagernes. It also started a route from Haugesund to Oslo in competition with SAS, another operation that gave losses. Coast air also has flown to Aberdeen from Bergen, but hasn't managed to make money on that route either, and closed it down. During most of 2005 the airline wetleased one of the Jetstream 31 aircraft to Vildanden on their route Skien-Bergen.

In 2001 the company lost 7,5 million NOK, and the owners had to put 12 million into the company. In August one of the three previous owners, Trygve Seglem, bought all the stocks in the holding company Kystfly AS through his investment company. The airline (operating company) is losing money. All aircraft leased from the holding company. No financial data is published for the holding company.