Throwbacks

Aloha Airlines survived for nearly 62 years, and had a long history of success and downfalls before collapsing in 2008. Founded in 1946 as Trans-Pacific Air, its inaugural flight occurred on July 26 using a DC 3. The name was changed to Aloha Airlines in 1958. With the change came the Jetprop F-27. And in […]

Iceland Express was a discounted carrier that was based in Keflavik, Iceland with the purpose of giving Icelanders an alternate low-cost carrier besides the nation’s flag carrier Icelandair. Formed by the parent company Northern Travel Holdings in 2002, the airline started flights in February 2003 with flights from Keflavik to London-Stansted and Copenhagen. Iceland Express […]

Pacific Southwest Airlines had humble beginnings in 1949. Kenny Freidkin founded the airline using a single DC-3. With knowledge from a previous attempt to start an airline and help from local travel agents, Freidkin began service between Oakland and San Diego with a stop in Burbank. The airline used war surplus buildings as a ticket […]

TWA, one of the oldest airlines, ceased operations on Dec. 1, 2001, after nearly 76 years. Founded on July 13, 1925 as Western Air Express, it merged with Transcontinental Air Transport just five years later, causing the name to change to Transcontinental & Western Air, or T&WA. It was originally founded to transport air mail, […]

Western Pacific Airlines, also known as WestPac for short, was a small Colorado airlines known for using their planes as billboards. The airline started in Colorado Springs in 1995 with eight Boeing 737-300 planes under the name Commercial Air. Soon after launch, Oklahoma millionaire and owner of Gaylord Hotels founder Edward Gaylord invested in the […]

EXTRA: Read part one of our look back at Continental  The 90s brought major changes to Continental. Frank Lorenzo resigned as president, in 1990, after 18 years in charge. He also sold his controlling share to Scandinavian Air System (SAS). Shortly after, Continental filed for bankruptcy for the second time in their history. This was […]

Continental, originally Varney Speed Services, started out like many airlines from the 1930s, carrying mail for the United States Postal service. With a focus on the Southwestern United States and new mail routes, Robert Six bought the Southwest division of Varney. In 1937, he moved the airline’s headquarters to Denver Stapleton Airport and changed the […]

USA 3000, originally known as Brendan Airways, was a small airline formed in 2001 as a way of flying cheap flights from the northeast to the Caribbean. USA3000 officially launched on December 28, 2001 with their first flight from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to Cancun, Mexico. USA3000 did most of their early work as charters, mostly for […]

Charter airlines are often overlooked in the aviation world. They operate irregular schedules on unusual routes. One of the more successful charter operators was Champion Air. Til their demise in early 2008 the airline provided service for sports teams, tour operators, and the United States government. The airline began was originally a part of the […]

In the early 2000s, Delta and other legacy carriers had a major headache to deal with: budget carriers. Airlines such as Southwest and jetBlue had started to dominate the Florida and other leisure markets and steal passengers from Delta. After Delta’s failed Delta Express model in the 1990s, the airline decided to try again, and […]