Eurofly
Encyclopedia
Eurofly was a privately owned airline
Airline
An airline provides air transport services for traveling passengers and freight. Airlines lease or own their aircraft with which to supply these services and may form partnerships or alliances with other airlines for mutual benefit...

 based in Milan
Milan
Milan is the second-largest city in Italy and the capital city of the region of Lombardy and of the province of Milan. The city proper has a population of about 1.3 million, while its urban area, roughly coinciding with its administrative province and the bordering Province of Monza and Brianza ,...

, Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

. Listed on MTA Stock Exchange and controlled by Meridiana
Meridiana
Meridiana fly is an airline with its head office on the grounds of Olbia - Costa Smeralda Airport in Olbia, Sardinia, Italy. It is Italy's second largest airline operating domestic and European services, as well as intercontinental flights. The airline mainly operates out of Cagliari-Elmas Airport,...

, it was Italy’s leading carrier in leisure flights market and mainly operated international, medium to long haul, point-to-point flights.

Medium haul activity was centered mainly on operations to Egypt and the Red Sea
Red Sea
The Red Sea is a seawater inlet of the Indian Ocean, lying between Africa and Asia. The connection to the ocean is in the south through the Bab el Mandeb strait and the Gulf of Aden. In the north, there is the Sinai Peninsula, the Gulf of Aqaba, and the Gulf of Suez...

 Riviera, Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...

 and Greece
Greece
Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , and historically Hellas or the Republic of Greece in English, is a country in southeastern Europe....

.
Long haul included some of Italians’ preferred tropical destinations like the Maldives
Maldives
The Maldives , , officially Republic of Maldives , also referred to as the Maldive Islands, is an island nation in the Indian Ocean formed by a double chain of twenty-six atolls oriented north-south off India's Lakshadweep islands, between Minicoy Island and...

 and Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka
Sri Lanka, officially the Democratic Socialist Republic of Sri Lanka is a country off the southern coast of the Indian subcontinent. Known until 1972 as Ceylon , Sri Lanka is an island surrounded by the Indian Ocean, the Gulf of Mannar and the Palk Strait, and lies in the vicinity of India and the...

 or Africa
Africa
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...

. Furthermore, during the summer season, Eurofly operates non-stop scheduled flights to New York City
John F. Kennedy International Airport
John F. Kennedy International Airport is an international airport located in the borough of Queens in New York City, about southeast of Lower Manhattan. It is the busiest international air passenger gateway to the United States, handling more international traffic than any other airport in North...

, exploiting the reverse seasonality of if compared to tropical destinations and focusing on incoming traffic to Italy.

In 2010, the airline merged with Meridiana to form Meridiana fly.

History

The airline was established on 26 May 1989 with the aim of selling medium haul flights to tour operators. Eurofly started its operations on 26 February 1990. It was set up with a 45% shareholding by Alitalia
Alitalia
Alitalia - Linee Aeree Italiane S.p.A. , in its later stages known as Alitalia - Linee Aeree Italiane S.p.A. in Extraordinary Administration, was the former Italian flag carrier...

 in response to the needs of the flag carrier to develop the leisure travel market. The original shareholding was divided between Alitalia
Alitalia
Alitalia - Linee Aeree Italiane S.p.A. , in its later stages known as Alitalia - Linee Aeree Italiane S.p.A. in Extraordinary Administration, was the former Italian flag carrier...

 (45%), Olivetti
Olivetti
Olivetti S.p.A. is an Italian manufacturer of computers, printers and other business machines.- Founding :The company was founded as a typewriter manufacturer in 1908 in Ivrea, near Turin, by Camillo Olivetti. The firm was mainly developed by his son Adriano Olivetti...

 (45%) and San Paolo Finance (10%). There have been several changes of ownership since.

Long-haul operations started in 1998 and in 2000, Alitalia acquired full control. In 2003, the company was privatized with 80% being sold to the Banca Profilo Spinnaker fund which acquired the remaining shares in July 2004. In the same year, Eurofly set-up an operations base in Sharm el Sheikh with two Airbus A320-200
Airbus A320
The Airbus A320 family is a family of short- to medium-range, narrow-body, commercial passenger jet airliners manufactured by Airbus Industrie.Airbus was originally a consortium of European aerospace companies, and is now fully owned by EADS. Airbus's name has been Airbus SAS since 2001...

 aircraft operating flights to several regional airports in Italy.

At the end of 2006, Spinnaker sold a 29,95% stake in Eurofly capital to Meridiana. Mr Giovanni Rossi (CEO of Meridiana) became CEO of Eurofly.

In January 2008, two capital increases took place and Meridiana participation in Eurofly's capital grew to 46.1%.

On 28 February 2010, Meridiana
Meridiana
Meridiana fly is an airline with its head office on the grounds of Olbia - Costa Smeralda Airport in Olbia, Sardinia, Italy. It is Italy's second largest airline operating domestic and European services, as well as intercontinental flights. The airline mainly operates out of Cagliari-Elmas Airport,...

 and Eurofly merged to create Italy's second biggest airline. The new airline is called Meridiana fly. For now both airlines aircraft will continue to carry there individual logos. However Eurofly's GJ code will immediately disappear and be replaced by Meridiana's IG code.

Fleet

The Eurofly fleet consisted of the following aircraft (at February 2010):

Eurofly Fleet
Aircraft Total Passengers
C Y Total
Airbus A320-214 6 0 180 180
Airbus A320-232 2
Airbus A320-233 1
Airbus A330-223 3 26 256 282
Total 12



At 4 July 2009, the average age of the Eurofly fleet was 6.8 years (http://www.airfleets.net/ageflotte/Eurofly.htm).

External links

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