Bmi (airline)

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

bmi
IATA BD	ICAO BMA	Callsign MIDLAND
Founded		1938 (as Air Schools Ltd)
Hubs		Manchester Airport London Heathrow Airport
Frequent flyer program		bmi Diamond Club
Member lounge		Diamond Club Lounge
Alliance		Star Alliance
Fleet size		42
Destinations		38
Parent company		British Midland Airways Ltd.
Headquarters		Castle Donington, England, United Kingdom
Key people		Nigel Turner (CEO), Sir Michael Bishop CBE (Chairman)
Website: http://www.flybmi.com

bmi is a scheduled airline based in the United Kingdom. The airline's headquarters are at Donington Hall, close to East Midlands Airport. It flies to destinations in Europe, the United States, the Caribbean and Saudi Arabia. BMI's operational bases are Manchester Airport and London Heathrow, where it holds 11% of all take off and landing slots and operates over 2000 flights a week. It was formerly known as British Midland. In January 2007 BMI bought British Mediterranean Airways, which means that from later this year, BMI will fly to a much wider range of destinations in Africa and the Middle East.

British Midland Airways Limited holds a United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority Type A Operating Licence, it is permitted to carry passengers, cargo and mail on aircraft with 20 or more seats ^[1]

Contents 1 History 2 Destinations 3 Fleet 4 Code sharing 5 Incidents & accidents 6 Diamond Club 7 References 8 External links

[edit] History

BMI's roots lie in the formation of Air Schools Ltd in 1938,^{[citation needed]} a company which specialised in flying instruction for RAF pilots. In 1949 the company formed Derby Aviation based at Burnaston near Derby and Wolverhampton Aviation based at Pendeford, near Wolverhampton offering ad-hoc charter and freight flights with De Havilland Rapides, as well as aircraft maintenance and brokerage. Roughly half a dozen people formed it in 1948 including Tommy Pike which who was an ASR pilot during the war.

Flying instruction ceased in 1953 with the start of scheduled flights from Derby and Wolverhampton to Jersey. When the first Douglas DC-3 arrived in 1955, Wolverhampton Aviation had been phased out and the company's sole base became Burnaston Airport. International services commenced in 1956 to Ostend and holiday flights to mainland Europe began. The company was also contracted by Rolls-Royce to transport aero engines to customers throughout the world. In 1959, the company changed its name to Derby Airways. Domestic scheduled flights within the United Kingdom were launched toward the end of the decade.

In 1964 the company changed its name once again to British Midland Airways (BMA) and moved operations from Burnaston to the recently opened East Midlands Airport. The corporate colours of blue and white were adopted at that time, with the introduction of the first turboprop aircraft, the Handley Page Herald. Minster Assets, an investment and banking group, acquired the airline in 1968. Domestic and European expansion continued apace and in 1970 BMA entered the jet age with the introduction of the BAC 1-11, followed by the Boeing 707 in 1971. The BAC 1-11s were withdrawn from service in 1972 and the 707s leased to other airlines as BMA concentrated on turboprops such as the Vickers Viscount. Though the 707 fleet was increased, none operated for BMA on scheduled services, or charter services on their behalf until 1981. Instead they were leased to other operators. The Douglas DC-9 converted most of the airline's domestic and European service to jet operation with its introduction in 1976.

In 1978 the company directors purchased the airline from Minster Assets. The consortium included Sir Michael Bishop who is now the airline's chairman. That year, British Midland and British Airways agreed to route swapping. This resulted in British Midland Airways relinquishing its continental routes from Birmingham to Brussels and Frankfurt and BA handing over its routes from Liverpool to Heathrow, Belfast, Dublin, Jersey, the Isle of Man and Glasgow. As a result, annual passenger numbers topped 1 million for the first time in 1979.

In 1981 an application to fly between Heathrow, Glasgow and Edinburgh was denied by the CAA. The ruling was overturned, however, after an appeal was lodged with the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry. With the introduction of these services, BMA and BA were now in direct competition.

BMA, together with British & Commonwealth Shipping, formed Manx Airlines in 1982, and the following year BMA purchased a 75% stake in Glasgow-based airline Loganair. In March 1987 Airlines of Britain Holdings (ABH) was formed to act as a holding company for British Midland and British Midland Aviation Services. ABH became British Midland in 1997 when it was de-merged as part of wide restructuring.

A new colour scheme was unveiled in 1985. Aircraft were now painted in very dark blue, with a deep grey lower half of the fuselage and a red relief. At this time, the airline simply became British Midland, and a new logo of a stylised red BM crowned with a diamond shape appeared on the aircraft tailfins (see right). Airport lounges were introduced at UK hubs and the Diamond Club frequent flyer programme was launched. The charter market was abandoned and the 707 fleet withdrawn at this time.

In 1992, British Midland became the first airline to offer a vegetarian choice of in-flight meals on UK domestic services as well as one of the first airlines in Europe to do so. Towards the end of the 1990s, British Midland switched to Airbus and Embraer for its fleet renewal programme.

In 1999, Scandinavian Airlines (SAS), a shareholder in British Midland since 1987, sold some of its stake to Lufthansa on the condition that British Midland joined the Star Alliance. BMI joined in 2000 and launched a new corporate identity in 2001. This involved the rebranding of the airline as bmi british midland (though BMI officially does not mean anything, it implies 'British Midland International'). The new identity features a brighter blue and the replacement of the grey with white. It brings a modern, fresh appearance with sweeping curves. In 2003, the "British Midland" portion was dropped and the airline is now referred to simply as BMI. The new identity coincided with the launch of transatlantic services in 2001 to Washington, DC and Chicago from Manchester Airport using wide-body Airbus A330 aircraft. Services from Manchester to Las Vegas followed soon after.

Between 1999 and 2004, Lufthansa was looking to sell its share in the airline. Virgin Atlantic was the main airline hoping to buy the shares and then forming a merger of the two airlines. A merger would bring together two well respected airlines with combined ticket sales of more than £2 billion, forming a powerful force in the aviation industry. Neither company would comment on the talks. BMI, headed by Sir Michael Bishop, is believed to have initiated the talks after it fell deep into the red following the September 11 attacks. A merger would give Virgin's Sir Richard Branson a far stronger base at Heathrow (where BMI has hundreds of valuable take-off and landing slots) to increase the competition with his rival British Airways.

The two airlines would have 17% of Heathrow slots against British Airways's 43%. British Airways was worried about the rivalry it would face if a merger went ahead, and considered the take over of either BMI or Virgin Atlantic to stop the merger of the two airlines. British Airways concluded it would be easier to take over the smaller airline Virgin Atlantic. In 2004 talks of any merger of the three airlines stopped.

In 2002, BMI set up a low-cost subsidiary bmibaby using redundant Boeing 737s which were displaced after BMI's fleet renewal programme favoured an all-Airbus fleet. bmibaby now flies routes between secondary airports around Europe, however it does not operate from Heathrow.

Despite the launch of transatlantic routes from Manchester, BMI has fought to gain the rights to serve the United States from Heathrow. Only British Airways, Air India, Virgin Atlantic, American Airlines, United Airlines, Air New Zealand, and Kuwait Airways are permitted to offer such routes.

BMI operated a service to Mumbai from London Heathrow between May 2005 until October 2006, after the UK and India concluded amendments to their bilateral air service agreement. Services to Riyadh followed, commencing on 1 September 2005 after British Airways ceased to serve Saudi Arabia earlier that year.

The BMI Group carried 7.95 million passengers during 2002. By 2005, the total had risen to 10.1 million, the third highest of any UK airline. (per United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority official statistics - see reference below)

In early 2006, the Association of European Airlines ^[2] reported a drop in passengers carried and load factors for BMI mainline and regional services (excluding bmibaby) whilst reporting increased loads for other AEA members over the same period. Despite this drop in passenger figures, BMI group reported ^[3] a pre-tax profit of £10.0 million for the year ending 31 December 2005. Today, the airline is owned by Sir Michael Bishop (50% plus 1 share), Lufthansa (30% minus 1 share) and SAS (20%).

In late 2006 the airline again dismissed renewed speculation that Virgin Atlantic Airways was preparing to make a bid to acquire full control of BMI, despite Sir Richard Branson repeating in a radio interview that such a merger would be a logical business move ^[4]. The airline also launched a scheduled service to Moscow Domodedevo in co-operation with Transaero on 29 October 2006 with a dedicated A320 (G-MIDO) with special seating for the service, including leather seats and a 40" seat pitch.

In January 2007 BMI bought British Mediterranean Airways-BMed[1] a British Airways franchise partner, and will gain access to new markets in Africa, Middle East and Central Asia that are served by the carrier.

In March 2007 BMI announced it intends to reveal details of new services from Heathrow to the USA, taking advantage of the end of Bermuda II restriction of services from that airport to the USA bought about by the EU-US open-skies pact due to start on 31 March 2008.^[5]

[edit] Destinations

Main article: BMI destinations

[edit] Fleet

The BMI fleet consists of the following aircraft, correct as of 14 February 2007 ^[6]:

BMI Fleet

Type	Number	Seats	Notes
Airbus A319-131	10		Plus three on order for May 2007
Airbus A320-232	11		Plus three in BMED fleet
Airbus A321-231	5		One returns to leasor during 1st quarter 2007. Plus five in BMED fleet and four on order for delivery in 2008
Airbus A330-243	3		One on short term lease to Virgin Nigeria until end of May 2007
Boeing 767-300ER	1		On lease from Arke Fly for use on routes to Saudi Arabia
Embraer ERJ 135	3
Embraer ERJ 145	13

The BMED fleet will be painted into bmi colours once the British Airways Franchise agreement ends at the end of the Summer 2007 timetable.

In March 2006, the average fleet age was 4.9 years ^[7]

[edit] Code sharing

The airline has code-share agreements with the following airlines (as of Feb 2007) ^[8]:

• Air Canada Agreement began July 1994
• Air France
• Air New Zealand Agreement began July 1996
• ANA Agreement began September 2001
• Austrian Airlines Agreement began July 1994
• Etihad Airways
• Gulf Air Agreement began January 1997
• LOT Polish Airlines
• Lufthansa Agreement began May 1997
• Malaysia Airlines Agreement began November 1994
• Qatar Airways
• Royal Brunei
• SAS Agreement began March 1994
• Singapore Airlines
• South African Airways Agreement began February 1999
• Spanair
• Sri Lankan Airlines
• TAP Portugal Agreement began February 1995
• Thai Airways International
• Transaero
• United Agreement began March 1992
• US Airways
• Virgin Atlantic Agreement began July 1995

[edit] Incidents & accidents

• The Stockport Air Disaster occurred when a Canadair C-4 Argonaut aircraft owned by British Midland Airways, registration G-ALHG, and operating a holiday charter flight, crashed near the centre of Stockport, Greater Manchester, United Kingdom on June 4, 1967. 72 of the 84 aboard were killed in the accident; 12 were seriously injured.
• On January 8, 1989, British Midland Flight 092, a Boeing B-737-400 series, G-OBME, crashed onto the embankment of the M1 motorway just short of the runway of East Midlands Airport, Leicestershire. 47 people died out of 118 passengers.

[edit] Diamond Club

BMI has a frequent flyer program called Diamond Club with blue, silver and gold levels. Awards are achieved by mileage flown. BMI has established a considerable following in its frequent flyer program due to its lower requirements and Star Alliance membership, but in 2005 changes to the program and the airline structure meant that lower fares now earn significantly fewer miles.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] References

1. ^ CAA Operating Licence
2. ^ Association of European Airlines
3. ^ Press Release - 2005 Profits
4. ^ Airliner World January 2007
5. ^ BMI Press Release
6. ^ UK Civil Aviation Authority Aircraft Register
7. ^ BMI Fleet Age
8. ^ bmi Key Facts Accessed on 29-Mar-2007

• United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority Passenger statistics for UK airlines, 2002 and 2005, table 0.1.6.

[edit] External links

• BMI
• British Photo Database - BMI