PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - What happened to all the Spanish charter airlines ?
Old 21st Oct 2021, 23:11
  #29 (permalink)  
WHBM
 
Join Date: Oct 2002
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They folded in the main (so did Vista Jet) due to (like Transeuropa and TAE a few years later) being in the back end position of having old, fuel and tech heavy jet fleets that needed renewal but there was no cash around.
Some carried on. I came through Palma in summer 1985, and was surprised to find Italian charter carrier Altair had sent three Caravelles into there from various northern Italian cities - I was also surprised overall to find Italians coming on package holidays to Majorca. They were later Caravelle 10Bs, with P&W JT8D engines, the onetime Finnair fleet.

Moments later we took off from what is now the western runway. The newer Palma eastern runway appeared to have been completed, but was not in use, and was being used for parking the whole of the onetime Spantax Convair 990 fleet, lined up in echelon along it, a distant sight as our 737 became airborne. They were there for years, most were scrapped in the early 1990s, but there's still one left there, sort-of preserved, but in decidedly weatherbeaten condition, Spantax livery under the dirt, in a remote area between the runways. Do look out for it if passing through. Here it is on Google Earth, a nice reminder of those old Spanish charter operators.

palma airport - Google Maps

Shame it's in such a weather-streaked condition, The owners should have remembered George Bernard Shaw (making a rare appearence in a post here) and his expression : "The rain in Spain falls mainly on the plane".

Sorry ...
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