AirUK

Air UK

IATA ICAO Callsign UK UKA UKAY
Founded	1980(1980)
Ceased operations	1998(1998) (rebranded asKLM uk)
Operating bases	Blackpool Exeter Guernsey Humberside Isle of Man Jersey Leeds/Bradford London–Southend London–Stansted Norwich Southampton
Subsidiaries	Air UK Leisure
Fleet size	36 aircraft (11Fokker 100, 11British Aerospace BAe 146(10 srs. 300, 1 srs. 100), 9Fokker 50, 5Fokker F-27 Friendship 500 (as of March/April 1997))
Destinations	British Isles Continental Europe
Parent company	British Air Transport (Holdings)
Headquarters	Redhill,Surrey,England,U.K.(1980–1984) Crawley,West Sussex,England, UK(1985–1987) London Stansted Airport,Essex,England, UK(1988–1997)
Key people	Sir Nicholas Cayzer Hon Anthony Cayzer Peter Villa Philip Chapman Neil Forster Stephen Hanscombe Andrew Gray Henny A. Essenberg Bob Frost Stuart Carson Harold Payne Allan McQuarrie James French Tony Le Mesurier Tony Camacho John Derbyshire Bob Coleman David McCammon Matt Button Leonard Nutter George White Robert Nunn E.F. Bates C.E. Smith Capt Alan Cottle Capt Christopher Haysom Capt P. Murphy
Website	AirUK

AirUKwas a wholly privately owned, independentregional airlinein theUnited Kingdomformed in 1980 as a result of amergerinvolving four rival UK-basedregional airlines.British and Commonwealth(B&C)-ownedBritish Island Airways(BIA) andAir Angliawere the two dominant merger partners.The mergedentity'scorporate headquarterswere originally located atRedhill,Surrey, the location of the old BIA head office.It subsequently relocated toCrawley,West Sussex.In addition to the main maintenance base atNorwich Airport(Air Anglia's former engineering base), there also used to be a second major maintenance base atBlackpool Airport(the old BIA engineering base).This was closed down following Air UK's major retrenchment duringBritain's severerecession of the early 1980s.In 1987, Air UK establishedAir UK Leisureas achartersubsidiary. The following year, Air UK shifted its headquarters toLondon Stansted Airport.When Stansted's newNorman Foster-designed terminal opened in 1991, the airline became its first and subsequently main tenant.

Air UK was a full member of theInternational Air Transport Association(IATA) for most of its existence.

Air UK originally was a wholly owned subsidiary of British Air Transport (Holdings), a successor to theAir Holdings Groupowned 90% by B&C and 10% byEagle Star Insurance.This made theCayzer family,who owned B&C, thecontrolling shareholders.Following the beginning of the gradualliberalisationof theEuropean Union(EU) internalair transportmarket in 1987, Dutchflag carrierKLM,a long-standing business partner of Air UK and its predecessor Air Anglia, acquired a 14.9% minority stake in Air UK'sholding company.In 1995, KLM increased its minority stake in Air UK to 45%. In 1997, KLM became Air UK's soleshareholderwhen it acquired B&C's stake in British Air Transport (Holdings).The following year Air UK was renamedKLM uk.

History

Aircraft operated

Air UK operated the following aircraft types at one point or another during its 19-year existence:

• Avion de Transport Regional (ATR) ATR-72(these aircraft were exclusively operated by KLM uk)
• BAC One-Eleven 200/400 series
• British Aerospace BAe 146100/200/300 series
• Embraer EMB-110 Bandeirante
• Fokker F27 Friendship100/200/400/500/600 series
• Fokker F28 Fellowship 1000/4000 series
• Fokker 50
• Fokker 100
• Handley Page Dart Herald
• Shorts 330
• Shorts 360

Fleet in 1980

In July 1980 the Air UK fleet comprised 37 aircraft.

An Air UKBAC One-Elevenstill in basicBIAlivery atBasel/Mulhouse EuroAirportin 1980.

An Air UKFokker F-27still in basicAir Anglialivery atAberdeen Airportin 1981.

An Air UKOne-Elevenin the original all-blue scheme in 1981.

Air UK employed 1,700 people at this time.

Fleet in 1983

In April 1983 the Air UK fleet comprised 21 aircraft.

An Air UKHandley Page Dart Heraldin the modified blue-and-white scheme atJersey Airportin 1983.

Air UK fleet in April 1983

Aircraft	Number
Fokker F27 Friendship 200	10
Handley Page Dart Herald	6
Embraer EMB-110 Bandeirante	5
Total	21

Air UK employed 850 people at this time.

Fleet in 1985

In March 1985 the Air UK fleet comprised 22 aircraft.

An Air UKF-27in the modified blue-and-white scheme atParis Charles de Gaulle airportin 1985.

Air UK fleet in March 1985

Aircraft	Number
Fokker F28 Fellowship 1000	1
Fokker F27 Friendship 200	16
Shorts 360	4
Shorts 330	1
Total	22

Air UK employed 850 people at this time.

Fleet in 1988

In March 1988 the Air UK fleet comprised 22 aircraft.

A pair of Air UKShorts 360sin the second scheme atHumberside Airportin 1989.

TwoBritish Aerospace BAe 146-200were on order.

Air UK employed 975 people at this time.

Fleet in 1990

In March 1990 the Air UK fleet comprised 27 aircraft.

Air UK employed 1,340 people at this time.

Fleet in 1995

An Air UKBAe 146-200in the second scheme atFrankfurt Airportin 1994.

An Air UKFokker 50in the final scheme atGuernsey Airportin 1995.

In March/April 1995 the Air UK fleet comprised 28 aircraft.

EightFokker 50were on order.

Air UK employed 1,466 people at this time.

Fleet in 1997

An Air UKFokker 100in the final scheme atDüsseldorf Airportin 1997.

In March/April 1997 the Air UK fleet comprised 36 aircraft.

Four Fokker 100 were on order.

Air UK employed 2,000 people at this time.

"Third Force"

Air UK was the name of the new airline resulting from the merger of BIA and Air Anglia.(BIA had already absorbedExeter-based Air Westward in March 1979).Cardiff-basedAir Waleshad become part of Air Anglia in June of that year.) It wasincorporatedon 1 January 1980.Operations commenced on 16 January 1980.At the time of its inception, Air UK was the largest regional airline in the UK and the country's third-largest scheduled carrier.It had a staff of 1,700, carried more than 1m, mainly scheduled, passengers annually and had a fleet of 40 aircraft,consisting of sixjets(four ex-BIABAC One-Eleven 400sand two ex-Air AngliaF-28 4000 series Fellowships) and 34turboprops(including eighteen ex-BIAHandley Page Dart Heralds,ten ex-Air AngliaFokker F-27 100/200 series Friendshipsand sixEmbraer 110 Bandeirantesoriginally part of the BIA, Air Wales and Air Westward fleets). Apart from the fourOne-Eleven 400s,which were predominantly operated oncharter flights,all the other aircraft were part of Air UK's scheduled service fleet.

Formarketingpurposes, there was no gap between the letters "U" and "K" in the "Air UK"logoin the newly merged entity's firstlivery,which was a stylisedUnion Flag.

Former BIA managing director Peter Villa became Air UK's first MD as well.

At the time of its creation, Air UK was sometimes referred to as the unofficial "Third Force" among the main contemporary scheduled airlines in the UK (British Caledonian(BCal) being the UK's official "Second Force" andBritish Airways(BA) the primary UK flag carrier at that time).

Following the merger, most of the fleet progressively adopted Air UK's new blue, white and red colour scheme. Originally, this featured a predominantly blue fuselage with a white-red-white strip across the windows and a white roof. The tail was also predominantly blue, apart from the "Air UK" logo.However, theCivil Aviation Authority(CAA) disapproved of this predominantly blue livery, arguing that it could potentially pose a safety hazard for other aircraft as it was difficult for other crews to see the blue aircraft against a blue sky. To address the CAA's safety concerns, Air UK decided to amend its original colour scheme by opting for a hybrid blue-and-white scheme featuring a blue fuselage and a white tail.

Air UK's scheduled route network initially served the following 33 points:Aberdeen,Amsterdam,Basel,Belfast,Bergen,Birmingham,Blackpool,Bournemouth,Brussels,Dublin,Düsseldorf,Edinburgh,Exeter,Glasgow,Guernsey,Humberside,Isle of Man,Jersey,Leeds/Bradford,Le Touquet,London Gatwick,London Heathrow,London Stansted,Manchester,Newcastle,Norwich,Ostend,Paris,Rotterdam,Southampton,Southend,Stavanger,andTeesside.

Air UK was the first and, at the time, only scheduled airline in the UK to fly from all three main London airports.

Following British Airways' decision to retire itsVickers Viscountturboprop fleet and to withdraw from its loss-making regional scheduled routes, Air UK assumed BA's regional routes fromHeathrowto Guernsey, Manchester to the Isle of Man, Leeds to Belfast and Dublin, and Edinburgh to Jersey in April 1980.Air UK's new, year-round Heathrow—Guernsey route was its most prominent scheduled route servingLondon's premier airport.(During the late 1970s, in the days prior to the construction of theM11,Air UK's predecessor Air Anglia had launched a year-round scheduled service linking Heathrow with the company's bases in Norwich and Humberside, as well as a year-round scheduled operation between London Gatwick and Leeds.)

Retrenchment

The severe recession of the early 1980s necessitated a majorretrenchment,resulting in extensive frequency, route and staff cutbacks. This entailed the closure of bases at Bournemouth, Humberside andStanstedas well as a major reduction in operations at Southend. As a consequence of these cutbacks, ten turboprop aircraft (seven Heralds and three Bandeirantes) were withdrawn from service while the twoF-28jets wereleasedout to Frenchregional carrierAir Alsace.This in turn resulted in the closure of the former BIA engineering base at Blackpool, accounting for 220 out of a total of 400 job losses.It also resulted in the suspension of scheduled passenger and cargo services to 14 points by late 1981. At the start of the 1981–82 winter timetable in November 1981, Air UK relaunched scheduled operations from Stansted by opening a new route to Amsterdam. This was the first international scheduled service from London's third airport in over ten years.The resulting network linked 20 points in theBritish Islesand six inEurope.Management hoped that these business realignments – including cutting the company's workforce in half over a two-year period— would reverse heavy losses Air UK had incurred during its first two years of operation, thereby stabilising the company and positioning it for future growth.

Reorganisation and renewed expansion

In 1982, Peter Villa led amanagement buyoutof Air UK's charter business,resulting in reconstitutingBIAas a charter-only airline and his departure from Air UK along with the four BAC One-Eleven 400s.In addition to the tough economic climate and merger blues during the airline's inception as a result of combining two organisations with vastly different cultures and management styles, the operation of these aircraft had largely been responsible for Air UK's poor financial performance that threatened the airline's survival.

1982 was also the year the CAA transferred Air UK'sGatwick—Guernsey licence to Guernsey Airlines, a newly formed regional operator, following numerous passenger complaints about the service Air UK had been providing ever since it had assumed the former BIA operation on that route.That year also saw Air UK joining forces withBritish Midlandto formManx Airlines,a new, jointly owned regional subsidiary based on the Isle of Man. Air UK parent B&C owned 25% of Manx Airlines, making it the newjoint venture's junior partner. (British Midland, which owned the remaining 75%, was the senior partner.) Air UK and British Midland hoped that transferring their loss-making Isle of Man operations to a dedicated, lower cost subsidiary would eventually make these services profitable.

In 1983, Air UKbroke evenfor the first time. This was also the year the airline acquired its firstShorts 330commuter turboprop plane, which it namedEnterprisein a publicity stunt atStansted Airportwhere the naming ceremony took place in the shadow of aBoeing 747shuttle carrier aircraftused byNASAto launchSpace Shuttle Enterprise.

By 1985, Air UK acquired additional Shorts 330/360s andFokker F-27s.The latter included the first stretched500 series F-27sfeaturing an increased seating capacity of 52 (as opposed to 44 for all shorter fuselageF-27models). To further support its ongoing expansion, Air UK temporarily leased anF-28 1000 seriesas well as two BIA One Eleven 400s during that period. (All of these aircraft wore different, white-based colour schemes.) Reintroduction ofjet equipmentenabled Air UK to assumeBritish Caledonian's regional operation between Glasgow, Newcastle and Amsterdam at the start of the 1985 summer timetable period,thereby further strengthening its position as the UK's leading regional feeder operator atAmsterdam Schipholand as the airport's largest foreign scheduled carrier.The additional aircraft also permitted several year-round, domestic and international scheduled services from Stansted to be reinstated.

In 1987, Air UK placed its first order forBAe's new146regionaljetliner.The introduction of Air UK's first 146 200 seriesregional jetcoincided with the introduction of a new livery, consisting of a white fuselage and tail with three different blue cheatlines merging into a stylised Union Flag on the aircraft's tail. In addition, this livery differed from the previous one by dropping the gap between the words "Air" and "UK" while inserting a gap between the letters "U" and "K" in "UK".

Following British Airways' takeover ofBritish Caledonianin December 1987, the CAA awarded Air UK the licences for the ex-BCal domestic feeder routes from Gatwick to Glasgow and Edinburgh in 1988. This resulted in an order for four stretchedBAe 146-300sto enable the launch of high-frequency services with up to seven daily round-trips on both routes from the start of the 1988–89 winter timetable period.

By 1994, Air UK acquired several, newFokker 100jet aircraft.The introduction of these aircraft led to the adoption of another new livery, the final Air UK-themed livery in the airline's 19-year history. This livery combined elements of the earlier livery with a new, single dark blue cheatline that included a thin, pale blue stripe merging into a dark blue tail featuring the previous Union Flag logo. It also combined elements of both previous liveries by dropping the gap between the "U" and "K" in "UK" (as in Air UK's original blue livery) as well as dropping the gap between the words "Air" and "UK" (as in the airline's second livery).

By 1995, Air UK had replaced all of the older, smallerF-27 100/200/400/600 seriesaircraft in its fleet with additional, stretchedF-27-500s.(Air UK operated a total of 22 F-27s of various marks throughout its existence, all of which it had acquired second-hand.)

By the late 1990s, a fleet of newFokker 50andATR-72turboprops replaced the aging F-27-500s. During that period Air UK also retired all of its146-200sas well as the146-100s.

Air UK Leisure

Air UK LeisureBoeing 737-400atMalta Airportin the mid-1990s.

In 1987, Air UK establishedAir UK Leisureas its new charter subsidiary in association with charter brokerage firm Viking International.

Air UK Leisure's corporate headquarters were located at Air UK's Stansted base. Its main operating bases were at London Gatwick, London Stansted and Manchester.

Operations commenced with three second-handBoeing 737-200s.These were replaced with seven brand-new737-400s,making Air UK Leisure firstEuropeanoperator of the -400in October 1988.

In 1993, Air UK Leisure entered the long-haul leisure market through the acquisition of a pair ofBoeing 767 300 ER serieswidebodiedaircraft. Both aircraft were contracted bytour operatorUnijet. Although Air UK Leisure operated these aircraft under the sameAir Operator Certificate(AOC) as its737 400 seriesnarrow-bodiedshort-/medium-haul fleet, it adopted theLeisure International Airwaysbrand for its long-haul operation.

Air UK Leisure was subsequently sold to Unijet, which in turn became part of theFirst Choicegroup.

Focusing on Stansted

Following the move to Stansted in 1988,Air UK became London's third airport's biggest resident airline and its main scheduled operator. The company began building a comprehensive network of short-haul domestic and European feeder routes that was intended to provide connecting traffic for the long-haul carriers that were then expected to commence operations from Stansted, as a result of the increasingly tightslotsituation at both London Heathrow as well as London Gatwick, at the time London's two main gateway/hubairports, especially at peak times. Air UK's move to the new Norman Foster-designed terminal in early 1991 provided the impetus for the launch of several new, year-round scheduled routes linking Stansted with important business destinations including Belfast, Düsseldorf,Frankfurt,Hamburg,Inverness,Madrid,Milan Linate,MunichandZürich(in addition to the existing year-round scheduled routes serving Aberdeen, Amsterdam, Brussels, theChannel Islands,Edinburgh, Glasgow andParis). However, the unfavourable economic conditions in the UK at the time, i.e. the severeearly 1990s recessionand the fallout from the firstGulf War,resulted in a sharp contraction of both the business and leisure travel markets. This in turn resulted in the spectacular collapse of the International Leisure Group (ILG) and itsAir Europeairline subsidiary, at the time the largest independent airline in the UK and Gatwick's biggest user, accounting for one-fifth of all the airport's slots. The then prevailing harsh economic climate also resulted in route and schedule cutbacks at other major airlines operating out of both main London airports. As a result, it became much easier to obtain viable slots at these airports, including at peak times. This meant that none of the contemporary major long-haul carriers were showing any interest in commencing operations at Stansted (with the sole exception ofAmerican Airlines,which ran a short-lived Stansted—Chicagoservice during the early 1990s). In addition, Stansted's considerably smaller catchment area and its greater distance from most parts of London compared with Heathrow and Gatwick, combined with poorertransportlinks in relation to Heathrow's and Gatwick's better accessibility, meant that Air UK found it extremely difficult to make its Stansted operation viable.

Rebranding

A KLM ukBAe 146with a companyFokker 50behind atLondon City Airportin 1999.

In 1997, KLM became the sole owner of Air UK.This resulted in the airline being rebranded as KLM uk in January 1998,including the adoption of a new livery. The legal name changed from Air UK Limited to KLM uk Limited in April 1998.

Initially, the rebranded airline launched new routes fromLondon Cityserving KLM's Amsterdam Schiphol hub as well as Glasgow and Edinburgh. However, from January 2000, the KLM uk routes that did not serve Amsterdam were either progressively transferred toBuzz,the KLM group's newlow-cost carrier,along with the remaining146-300aircraft or closed. KLM uk adopted this newstrategyin response to its increasing inability to match the far lower costs of the rapidly growing "no frills"competition on the main London—Scotlandtrunk routes, especiallyLuton-basedEasyJetand former British Airways subsidiaryGobased at Stansted itself. By 2001, Buzz operated 14 point-to-point routes from Stansted. Many of these were former Air UK routes served with a fleet of eight BAe 146-300s handed down from Air UK and two independently sourced, second-handBoeing 737-300s.In addition, scheduled routes not transferred to Buzz and serving destinations other than Amsterdam were eventually all withdrawn, thus reducing the network to only 15 routes exclusively linking regional UK airports to Amsterdam Schiphol. This also resulted in the retirement of KLM uk's ATR-72s.

In 2002, KLM decided to integrate what was left of KLM uk intoKLM Cityhopper,its wholly owned, Dutch-based regional subsidiary. It also decided to sell Buzz toRyanairthe following year. This transaction constituted the final link in a long chain of events connecting the early- to mid-20th century decision ofBritish & Commonwealth Shipping,ashipping companythat could trace its roots to the 19th century, to diversify intocommercial aviationthrough ownership of several of the post-/pre-warindependent airlines that merged to formBritish United Airways,the UK's dominant private sector airline conglomerate of the 1960s, with what is arguably the world's most commercially successful airline of the first decade of the 21st century.

Further developments

By late 2009, several regional point-to-point routes plied by Air UK and its predecessors for many years, which were dropped soon after Dutch flag carrier KLM had become the airline's sole owner, had been taken over byEastern AirwaysandFlybe,with the former concentrating on the ex-Air Angliaoil-related business routes along Britain's East Coast and the latter focusing on former BIA/Air Westward routes serving the southern and western parts of the UK.

Incidents and accidents

There were four recorded non-fatal incidents during Air UK's 19-year existence from 1980 until 1998.

• On 11 June 1984,an empty ex-BIA Handley Page Dart Herald (registration: G-BBXI),was parked atBournemouth Airportwhen a lorry struck the aircraft and damaged it beyond repair.
• On 19 July 1990, an ex-Air Anglia F-27-200 (registration G-BCDO)had an accident while landing atAmsterdam Schiphol Airportat the end of a scheduled flight from London Stansted. The aircraft's right-hand main gear failed to lock down while preparing to land. This resulted in aforced landingwith the right gear retracted, damaging the aircraft beyond repair. There were no injuries among the 17 passengers and four crew members. (The aircraft was subsequently ferried to Air UK's base at Norwich Airport, where it was withdrawn from service and scrapped.)
• On 31 March 1992, a BAe 146-300 G-UKHP overran runway 34 at Aberdeen (Dyce) Airport after landing on a wet runway with high crosswinds. The pilot failed to deploy the spoilers and ran off the end of the runway. The aircraft was not badly damaged and no passengers were hurt.
• On 7 December 1997, an F-27-500F (registration: G-BNCY) had an accident atGuernsey Airportat the end of a scheduled service from Southampton. The aircraft overran the runway while landing in high crosswinds and came to rest in an adjacent field with its left landing gear collapsed.There were no injuries among the 50 passengers and four crew. (The aircraft was damaged beyond repair and subsequently written off.)

See also

• List of defunct airlines of the United Kingdom

Notes

Notes

Citations

References

• "Flight International".Flight International.Sutton, UK: Reed Business Information.ISSN0015-3710.(World Airline Directory,1980–2003)
• Calder, Simon (2002).No Frills – The Truth behind the Low-cost Revolution in the Skies.London, UK: Virgin Books.ISBN1-85227-932-X.
• "Travel Trade Gazette".Travel Trade Gazette(UK & Ireland ed.). London, UK.ISSN0262-4397.(various copies, 1980–2003)

Further reading

• "Aircraft (Gone but not forgotten: Jersey Airlines – United into BUA)".Aircraft.Hersham, UK: Ian Allan Publishing: 66. June 2011.ISSN2041-2150.(Aircraft)

External links

• AirUK(Archive)
• European Commission Merger Decision on Case IV/M.967 of 22/09/1997 (KLM/AIR UK)
• contemporary timetable images