Blue Air

Not to be confused with Airblue or JetBlue.
Blue Air
IATA ICAO Callsign
0B BMS BLUE TRANSPORT
Founded 2004
Commenced operations 2004
Operating bases
Hubs Henri Coandă International Airport
Secondary hubs Turin Airport
Frequent-flyer program My Blue
Fleet size 16
Destinations 34
Headquarters Bucharest, Romania
Key people Gheorghe Răcaru, CEO
Website blueairweb.com

Blue Air, legally Blue Air - Airline Management Solutions S.R.L, is a Romanian low-cost airline headquartered in Sector 1, Bucharest,[1] with its main bases at Henri Coandă International Airport and Turin Airport.[2]

History

Blue Air started operations in December 2004. At its founding, Blue Air also operated a domestic Bucharest-Timișoara flight, though this was discontinued in March 2005 due to low demand and competition from TAROM as well as Căile Ferate Române, the Romanian rail company. Blue Air began domestic flights to Cluj International Airport from Bucharest on 29 October 2006, operated with a Boeing 737.

The company had a turnover of 150 Million Euros in 2012 and a load factor of 92%.[3]

On 12 April 2013, the Blue Air administration made public the fact that the company is for sale.[4] On the 17 May 2013, a press release was issued announcing that BlueAir Transport Aerian SA's flight operations will be transferred to Airline Management Solution SRL, a company that bailed out the business with a 30 million EUR deal. The new company is registered in Romania by 4 shareholders, 2 Romanians with 33% each (both BlueAir pilots) and 2 other Romanians with 17% each (one BlueAir employee and one with past ticketing and customer service affairs with the old company).[5]

The airline transported 1.5 million people in 2014, an increase compared to the 1.35 million people in 2013.[6] In 2015, the airline transported for the first time more than 2 million passengers.[7]

Blue Air has had an excellent start of 2016, having become a full member of IATA (International Air Transport Association) on 19 January. This milestone is a prerequisite for closer cooperation with many airlines, providing Blue Air’s passengers with an enhanced network around the world. Additionally, IATA awards the IOSA (IATA Operational Safety Assessment) certification for the highest safety standards – an award Blue Air received in December 2015. In addition, Blue Air is a member of ICH (IATA Clearing House) and participates in MITA (IATA Multilateral Interline Traffic Agreements). With a total of 30 new routes announced so far (as of May 2016), the airline forecast it will handled close to three million passengers in 2016.

Operations

Bases

Blue Air Boeing 737-400 wearing the former livery

Blue Air always used Bucharest as its homebase. At first, the homebase was Bucharest Baneasa - BBU until the airport became overcrowded and was absorbed by the city, so it had to be closed to airlines in 2012. Officially the airport was not closed, but the operating taxes for the airlines had suddenly grown until no airline could support them.[8] At this point all airlines moved their operations to Bucharest Otopeni - OTP airport. Blue Air now uses this airport as its homebase.

The second homebase is Turin-Caselle Airport in Italy from November 2014. The total number of destinations to and from Turin are 15.

The third operating base for Blue Air is located at Bacău International Airport. BlueAir Transport Aerian SA (the original owner) managed to get a concession contract for 50 years of private administration of the airport. BlueAero was the secondary company that held the contract. The airport needed some fast investments which the company promised to complete, but they did not even reach 10% of those investments in more than 2 years. When Airline Management Solution SRL took over the operations it choose not to take the airport so it signed it off back to the government. The airline is now the only operator on the airport. TAROM and Carpatair had domestic and international flights from here, but they discontinued.

Blue Air's bases also include Larnaca Airport (2 aircraft based) and Iasi Airport (2 aircraft based), the primary international gateway for the north-eastern part of Romania, serving a catchment area of over 3.7 million people

Destinations

Main article: Blue Air destinations

Blue Air has been operating for 11 years and now offers flights to over 70 scheduled destinations in Belgium, Cyprus, France, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Portugal, Romania, Sweden, Spain, and the United Kingdom. Furthermore, under its own brand and with the slogan “Follow your dreams and fly”, Blue Air operates charter flights on behalf of leading tour operators and holiday destinations throughout Europe and West Asia, mainly the Mediterranean region

Starting on 25 October 2015 the company has two daily scheduled domestic flights between Bucharest and Iași.[9]

On 29 March, Blue Air has switched back to the summer schedule and started offering many popular destinations within Europe. The airline has made improvements to 30 new routes that will be perfect for its passengers’ warm-weather getaways this summer, namely:

Fleet

Blue Air Boeing 737-800

As of December 2015, the Blue Air fleet consists of the following aircraft:[10][11]

Blue Air Fleet
Aircraft In Service Orders Passengers Notes
Boeing 737-300 2 — 136
141
Boeing 737-400 9 4 170
Boeing 737-500 1 5 126
Boeing 737-700 1 — 144
Boeing 737-800 2 4 189
Total 15 13

In the past, Blue Air also operated Saab 2000 and Saab 340 aircraft, the latter one leased from Direct Aero Services.

Starting December 2015 the airline is IOSA accredited.[12] Starting January 19, 2016, Blue Air has become a full member of IATA (International Air Transport Association)

Accidents and incidents

On January 7, 2016, a Blue Air Boeing 737-400, registration YR-BAS performing charter flight 0B-9301 from Bucharest Henri Coanda International Airport (Romania) to Barcelona (Spain) was supposed to land at Cluj International Airport (Romania) to pick up several passengers. While landing, with 110 passengers and 6 crew, on Cluj's runway 25 at 08:02L (06:02Z), the plane overran the end of the runway by about 10 meters (32 feet) and came to a stop with all gears on the paved surface of the runway end safety area. No injuries occurred, the aircraft sustained no damage. The passengers disembarked normally via mobile stairs and were bused to the terminal.[13][14] Cluj-Napoca International Airport was closed for cca. 3 hours due to the incident.

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Contact." Blue Air. Retrieved on 26 December 2010. "Romania, Bucharest, Sector 1, Buzesti,l street 71, 5th floor, Tax reg no 16091846"
  2. ↑ "Contact." Blue Air. Retrieved on 7 September 2010.
  3. ↑ http://m.romanialibera.ro/stire-302333.html
  4. ↑ http://www.mediafax.ro/economic/compania-aeriana-blue-air-scoasa-la-vanzare-10735346
  5. ↑ http://www.romania-insider.com/belgian-romanian-firm-takes-over-low-cost-airline-blue-air-in-eur-30-million-deal/99506/
  6. ↑ http://newsair.ro/blue-air-estimeaza-ca-a-transportat-15-milioane-de-pasageri-in-2014.html
  7. ↑ "Peste 2 milioane de pasageri transportati de Blue Air in 2015". T2T.ro (in Romanian). Retrieved 2015-12-27.
  8. ↑ http://www.zf.ro/companii/inchiderea-aeroportului-baneasa-dezvaluie-o-comoara-imobiliara-de-un-miliard-de-euro-9369706
  9. ↑ "Bucuresti – Iasi cu Blue Air".
  10. ↑ http://ch-aviation.com/portal/airline/BLR#al_profile_tab_fleet
  11. ↑ Blue Air at airfleets.net
  12. ↑ "Blue Air a primit certificarea IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA)".
  13. ↑ "Incident: Blue B734 at Cluj on Jan 7th 2016, runway excursion on landing". Retrieved January 9, 2016.
  14. ↑ "Blue Air plane slips off the runway at Romania’s Cluj airport". Retrieved January 9, 2016.

External links

Media related to Blue Air at Wikimedia Commons

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