Britannia Airways

1 Code Data
2 History
3 Services
4 Fleet
5 Bibliography
6 External links

[edit] Code Data

IATA Code: BY
ICAO Code: BAL
Call sign: Britannia (all 757/767 and 737 charter flights) / Thomson (737 scheduled flights)

[edit] History

The airline was established on December 1, 1961 and started operations on 5 May 1962 as Euravia flying ex-Skyways Lockheed Constellations on inclusive tour holidays for Universal Sky Tours. The name Britannia Airways was adopted on August 16, 1964 to coincide with re-equipping with the Bristol Britannia turboprop airliner. In 1965 Britannia became part of Thomson, itself part of the International Thomson Organisation.

Britannia began to re-equip with Boeing 737-200 in 1968, the first European charter operator of the type. Britannia was also the first European airline to fly the Boeing 767. In August 1988 Britannia's immediate parent company, the Thomson Travel Group, purchased Horizon Travel and its airline, Orion Airways, which was integrated into Britannia.

In 1997 Britannia formed a wholly owned subsidiary, Britannia GmbH, based in Germany to operate long and short-haul flights from airports in Germany, Switzerland and Austria for German tour operators, but this was closed in March 2001.

At the start of 1998 the Thomson Travel Group acquired the Scandinavian holiday operation, Fritidsresor Group, and its airline Blue Scandinavia, now renamed Britannia Nordic.

At 21:47 UTC (local time 23:49) on September 14, 1999, Britannia Flight BY226A crashed on approach to Gerona Airport, Spain whilst landing in poor weather conditions. Torrential rain, and the extinguishing of runway lights hindered the landing of the aeroplane, which bounced and then landed with its nose pointing down on its second attempt. Other causes of the crash have been given as destabilisation of the approach at a height below 250ft - meaning that the plane was not level enough, not at the right speed and not at the right rate of descent to make a good landing, and the effect of shock or mental incapacitation on the plane's 57-year-old captain at the failure of the runway lights which could have inhibited him from making a decision to abort the landing and go round again, and insufficient information on the intensity of the storm in the area. Upon hitting the ground, the Boeing 757 slid off the runway, and came to rest in three pieces in a field outside the airport boundary. Fifty five people were injured, and one man died of a heart attack five days later. [1]

In 2000 Thomson Travel Group and Britannia Airways were acquired by Preussag AG (TUI Group) of Germany. As part of a wider reorganisation of TUI's UK operations in September 2004 it was announced that Britannia would be rebranded as Thomsonfly. This airline's planes carried the Thomson colours and logo, but its aircraft were owned and operated by Britannia Airways. In effect Thomsonfly was a trading name of Britannia.

As of October 31, 2005, Britannia Airways Ltd ceased to exist, with Thomsonfly becoming the legal name of the company. The aircraft are no longer 'operated by Britannia Airways' but actually operated legally by Thomsonfly.

Britannia Airways was featured on the ITV fly on the wall Docusoap Airline ITV.