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Former German charter airline From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Blue Wings AG was a charter airline based in Germany, focusing on serving Turkey, the Middle East and Russia from its base at Düsseldorf Airport.[1] The headquarters were located on the airport property.
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Founded | 2002 | ||||||
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Ceased operations | 31 January 2012 | ||||||
Operating bases | Düsseldorf Airport | ||||||
Fleet size | 11 (at time of closure) | ||||||
Destinations | 23 | ||||||
Headquarters | Bocholt, Germany | ||||||
Key people | Udo Stern (MD) | ||||||
Website | bluewings.com |
Blue Wings was established in 2002, received the AOC on 27 June 2003 and started operations in July of the same year. It initially operated charter flights from Düsseldorf using a wet-leased Airbus A320. In June 2006, the Russian National Reserve Corporation (NRC) acquired a 48 percent shareholding through its Zürich based subsidiary Alpstream AG, which was intended to lead to a close co-operation between Blue Wings and Red Wings Airlines, also belonging to NRC.[1]
On 6 October 2006, Blue Wings signed a purchase agreement with JetBlue Airways for five second-hand Airbus A320-200 aircraft. For cost-saving reasons, Blue Wings adopted a nearly identical color scheme compared to JetBlue. On 17 October of the same year, another order - this time for 16 new Airbus A320 and 4 Airbus A321 was signed, and subsequently announced during the Farnborough Air Show of the same year.[2]
On 30 December 2009, the Federal Office for Civil Aviation of Germany revoked the operating license of Blue Wings because of solvency fears,[3] forcing the airline to shut down all operations. Blue Wings was saved for once on 23 April of the same year, when it was announced that Elite Aviation, a VIP charter airline from Abu Dhabi, had signed a charter agreement with Blue Wings.[4] Subsequently, the license was reinstated on 5 May.
On 5 August 2009, it was announced that Iraqi Airways, Iraq's national airline, had signed a contract to lease three Blue Wings Airbus A320-232, which were used on European routes.[5]
On 13 January 2010, Blue Wings ceased all operations, filing bankruptcy due to the financial crisis which had led to a pull-out of investors. The airline's corporate head office was located in Düsseldorf,[6] at Düsseldorf Airport. Before closure it was in Terminal A.[7][8] Previously it was in Hangar 8 at the same airport.[9]
Blue Wings operated the following international scheduled destinations in November 2011:[10]
The Blue Wings fleet consisted of the following aircraft (at 25 November 2012):[11][12]
Aircraft | Total | Orders | Passengers (Business/Economy) |
---|---|---|---|
Airbus A320-200 | 11 | 16[citation needed] | 150 (12/138) 168 (0/168) |
Airbus A321-200 | 3 | 3[citation needed] | 207 |
Tupolev Tu-204 | — | 5[citation needed] | TBA |
Total | 14 | 24 |