LUTON History and Nostalgia
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G-DEBA 9/5/96. Operations commenced on 19th June 1996, initially to Barcelona, Munich and Dusseldorf/Moenchengladbach then to Newcastle, Madrid and Copenhagen later in the year.
G-DEBC 2/6/96
Only operated by Debonair in their last few months, G-DEBM seen here on 31/3/99 was about to get Swissair Express titles and Swiss flag on the tail prior to operating on their behalf from Zurich. http://www.airliners.net/search?regi...display=detail
G-AYOP 6/9/99. Originally Court Line (yellow), Debonair used this aircraft for the last 4 months of their existence prior to entering receivership on 30/9/99.
2 737-300's were leased briefly from AB Airlines for the first half of 1999:-
G-OABD 16/5/99
G-OABL 11/2/99.
A comprehensive history of Debonair is available here:-
DEBONAIR AIRWAYS, LTD.: United Kingdom (1995-1999)
Oh and a search for "Debonair" in my photos also found this one, which I couldn't resist adding given the current football fever gripping the nation (well, some of it at least). Taken on the day of the Euro96 final between Germany and the Czech Republic (the Czechs all flew into Stansted).
Last edited by cj241101; 5th Jul 2018 at 10:09.
VG, I didn't mention the cabin service standards - that doesn't bother a pilot much.
I agree Suckling offered a very unusual and friendly - though hugely expensive - service to pax and the food was very good. Only cold stuff though as there were no ovens on the 228 and despite the food & drinks baskets having to be stored on the "splash tray" in front of the toilet and on it's lid for t/o and landing. Utterly revolting! Can you imagine getting away with that today? I don't know how they got away with that even then.
Reliability/on time performance can often be enhanced by operating small aircraft and using quiet airfields and sneaking into gaps between heavies at larger ones and worked quite well and is always artificially enhanced on such aged and tired-out aircraft as long as they "never" go wrong and the weather "never" falls below Cat1 limits (200ft cloudbase, double that at Cambridge) This may well fool pax but it doesn't fool most pilots.
ISTR that the LTN - AMS route was killed by the announcement that the shortly-to-be-started Debonair was introducing the same route.
I agree Suckling offered a very unusual and friendly - though hugely expensive - service to pax and the food was very good. Only cold stuff though as there were no ovens on the 228 and despite the food & drinks baskets having to be stored on the "splash tray" in front of the toilet and on it's lid for t/o and landing. Utterly revolting! Can you imagine getting away with that today? I don't know how they got away with that even then.
Reliability/on time performance can often be enhanced by operating small aircraft and using quiet airfields and sneaking into gaps between heavies at larger ones and worked quite well and is always artificially enhanced on such aged and tired-out aircraft as long as they "never" go wrong and the weather "never" falls below Cat1 limits (200ft cloudbase, double that at Cambridge) This may well fool pax but it doesn't fool most pilots.
ISTR that the LTN - AMS route was killed by the announcement that the shortly-to-be-started Debonair was introducing the same route.
Last edited by meleagertoo; 5th Jul 2018 at 10:25.
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Some more from 30/6/96:-
Also on football flights that day (no photos though) were:-
EI-CJK A300 Sobelair
OE-LAT 767-300 Lauda Air
OY-CNL A300 Premiair
PH-MCV 767-300 Martinair
plus those in the earlier photo were Condor DC-10 D-ADLO, Aero Lloyd MD83 D-ALLO, Hapag-Lloyd A310 D-AHLB, Lufthansa 737-200 D-ABFR, Lufthansa A310 D-AIDC and Lufthansa 737-500 D-ABJE.
Those were the days !
Also on football flights that day (no photos though) were:-
EI-CJK A300 Sobelair
OE-LAT 767-300 Lauda Air
OY-CNL A300 Premiair
PH-MCV 767-300 Martinair
plus those in the earlier photo were Condor DC-10 D-ADLO, Aero Lloyd MD83 D-ALLO, Hapag-Lloyd A310 D-AHLB, Lufthansa 737-200 D-ABFR, Lufthansa A310 D-AIDC and Lufthansa 737-500 D-ABJE.
Those were the days !
Last edited by cj241101; 5th Jul 2018 at 10:35.
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Last scheme worn by this aircraft (G-AOVS) was the fictitious "Redair" for the 1980 BBC drama "Buccaneer" which basically closely copied the story of Redcoat flying cargo charters from the UK to Africa. I believe the ill-fated G-BRAC acquired similar titles. The fictional country "Ximbali" and its airport was actually Cranfield.
"meleagertoo", I defer to your comments re warm food but perhaps they had something else going on in the loo? Perish the thought. Wasn't the process to collect the meals from nearby housewives shortly before departure. Perhaps they arrived warm? WRT to your comment about cabin crew not bothering the pilots, I remember that after a pretty sporty crosswind landing at Manchester which severely tested the Dornier's u/c, the hostie whizzed up to the cockpit carrying a very nice picture of a daffodil in a pot. When I asked her what it was all about she said that she told the captain,"You planted it, now you can water it!". Happy Days.
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The Debonair management were clueless when it came to putting together schedules. I mean who wants to go from Luton to Barcelona at 9am when all other airlines would be arriving at 9am !! The aircraft (B733) then turned and flew to Gatwick, crew change then back to Barcelona then back to Luton. A classic W pattern but the timings were awful. Management blamed a lack of Barcelona slots being available.
The Munich schedules were all cock-eyed too. Leave Luton at 8am and get to Munich at 1130 local then sit there for the day until 1800 local before returning to Luton. They then had that aircraft schedule for the Luton to Moenchengladbach but the aircraft only had a 30 minute window before Moenchengladbach closed. Invariably, most evening arrivals diverted to Dusseldorf which then meant the morning rotation to Luton was delayed whilst waiting for passengers to get from Moenchengladbach to Dusseldorf. Some days the aircraft would fly Luton to Munich to Barcelona to Munich to Luton but the way they had crews rostered was unbelievable until someone stepped in and tore up the rosters and started again to make it more efficient.
The best one though was Luton to Rome leaving at 0915. By the time you got to Rome, half the day was gone. The aircraft could have flown a UK domestic schedule then return to Luton before the Rome trip but management kept it on the ground to 0915. An utter waste of an aircraft's available time.
The classic though was when the CEO decided to contract 5 x 146's out to Lufthansa and 2 to Air France and failed to tell anyone else such as engineering, ops, crewing, reservations. They got a weeks notice to put it all together and as a result of taking 7 aircraft out of the Debonair daily schedule, that in itself imploded and the result was a foray of costly sub-charters. So what money was being made on contracting out to Lufthansa/Air France was lost on sub-charters. Waste of time.
The CEO then pulled the same stunt again and contracted 2 x 146's out to Swissair. So of the fleet of I think 12 aircraft at the time, 9 were contracted out. Most of the ground staff in the terminal and ops/crewing were on the verge of nervous breakdowns trying to keep everything running and passengers happy and management simply did not care.
An utter chaotic airline if ever there was one.....
The Munich schedules were all cock-eyed too. Leave Luton at 8am and get to Munich at 1130 local then sit there for the day until 1800 local before returning to Luton. They then had that aircraft schedule for the Luton to Moenchengladbach but the aircraft only had a 30 minute window before Moenchengladbach closed. Invariably, most evening arrivals diverted to Dusseldorf which then meant the morning rotation to Luton was delayed whilst waiting for passengers to get from Moenchengladbach to Dusseldorf. Some days the aircraft would fly Luton to Munich to Barcelona to Munich to Luton but the way they had crews rostered was unbelievable until someone stepped in and tore up the rosters and started again to make it more efficient.
The best one though was Luton to Rome leaving at 0915. By the time you got to Rome, half the day was gone. The aircraft could have flown a UK domestic schedule then return to Luton before the Rome trip but management kept it on the ground to 0915. An utter waste of an aircraft's available time.
The classic though was when the CEO decided to contract 5 x 146's out to Lufthansa and 2 to Air France and failed to tell anyone else such as engineering, ops, crewing, reservations. They got a weeks notice to put it all together and as a result of taking 7 aircraft out of the Debonair daily schedule, that in itself imploded and the result was a foray of costly sub-charters. So what money was being made on contracting out to Lufthansa/Air France was lost on sub-charters. Waste of time.
The CEO then pulled the same stunt again and contracted 2 x 146's out to Swissair. So of the fleet of I think 12 aircraft at the time, 9 were contracted out. Most of the ground staff in the terminal and ops/crewing were on the verge of nervous breakdowns trying to keep everything running and passengers happy and management simply did not care.
An utter chaotic airline if ever there was one.....
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Last scheme worn by this aircraft (G-AOVS) was the fictitious "Redair" for the 1980 BBC drama "Buccaneer" which basically closely copied the story of Redcoat flying cargo charters from the UK to Africa. I believe the ill-fated G-BRAC acquired similar titles. The fictional country "Ximbali" and its airport was actually Cranfield.
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JENKINS - I'm assuming you weren't one of the those sorting out the chaos but instead one who collected those allowances at the hotel 
Debonair should have concentrated on being an ACMI airline because clearly there was enough work for it but to try and do schedule and ACMI with no slack in the fleet was a suicidal move.
Debonair should have concentrated on being an ACMI airline because clearly there was enough work for it but to try and do schedule and ACMI with no slack in the fleet was a suicidal move.
I'd heard it said, back in the day, that the airline was run more to the whims/dreams/ego of the founder than to realistic route/timings and type of airline (budget).....Had they concentrated on the ACMI market, they might still be here like Titan etc.
To pick the plums out of the pudding;
What about the Calabria regional services contract (local government sponsored/brokered)for four - five aircraft (?) that got as far as the route proving flights before someone in Alitalia noticed that the contract had not gone out to tender as EU law required. It had all been quietly done on "private handshakes". Is there any connection between Italian American iffy businessmen and the deep South of Italy I wonder? How naiive is that - imagining they could get away with it?
Or the insane plan to equip the fleet with "Boeing" 717s (aka a DC9 with tits) which was a ludicrously unsuitable aircraft for a lo-co carrier - not that the 146 was exactly the best choice either. Decisions like that seemed to be made on a whim or because someone made up some nice looking artwork on their sales pitch. There wasn't much sign of any commercial thinking going on.
Many thought that the chaotic, disastrously inefficient style and general lack of any sort of management was a result of the company never being intended to make a profit - ie a way of "cleaning up" investors' money - most of which was from those Italian Americans.
Mancassola's previous attempt to start an airline (Discovery was it?), of which Debonair was a carbon copy down to that bloody bear and the embarrassing grey prep-school "uniforms" failed ignominiously right before launch in a style reminiscent of the Calabrian job. He didn't have much of a track record.
The Chief pilot/Flt Ops Dir. was straight out of the RAF and knew absolutely zip about civil ops and his sidekick the Teflon-coated Chief training "Captain" could be frightening to fly with. They did eventually get a decent F.O.D but although he tried mightily by then it was too late.
It was immense fun but many crew knew in their hearts that it could not carry on. Five day rotations staying in luxurious apartment-suites in BRU and flying perhaps six sectors in that time. 5 day trips that went something like Posn MUC, Operate MUC BCN. SBY. BCN MUC BCN early finish. SBY. Posn LTN on the early. Home for lunchtime! Eat lots of tapas. Drink lots of beer. Get to know Barcelona better than your own home! What a jolly! SBY for a day in CPH with only one flight passing trough was always a joy. LTN MGL LTN was sometimes a day's work! Home before lunchtime! Captains got suites in some hotels, great for crew parties but at what cost? I doubt anyone flew more than 300hrs in a year. Days spent cycling around Bavaria and eating Schnitzel. There was even a crew hire car there so on the early rotations it was possible to ski Kitzbuel in the afternooon! - it was the best holiday ever while it lasted. Best crews and party scene ever too, just a shame about the appallingly inept management.
Even so, the aircraft were well maintained and great fun to fly and commands came quickly. Good days.
Or the insane plan to equip the fleet with "Boeing" 717s (aka a DC9 with tits) which was a ludicrously unsuitable aircraft for a lo-co carrier - not that the 146 was exactly the best choice either. Decisions like that seemed to be made on a whim or because someone made up some nice looking artwork on their sales pitch. There wasn't much sign of any commercial thinking going on.
Many thought that the chaotic, disastrously inefficient style and general lack of any sort of management was a result of the company never being intended to make a profit - ie a way of "cleaning up" investors' money - most of which was from those Italian Americans.
Mancassola's previous attempt to start an airline (Discovery was it?), of which Debonair was a carbon copy down to that bloody bear and the embarrassing grey prep-school "uniforms" failed ignominiously right before launch in a style reminiscent of the Calabrian job. He didn't have much of a track record.
The Chief pilot/Flt Ops Dir. was straight out of the RAF and knew absolutely zip about civil ops and his sidekick the Teflon-coated Chief training "Captain" could be frightening to fly with. They did eventually get a decent F.O.D but although he tried mightily by then it was too late.
It was immense fun but many crew knew in their hearts that it could not carry on. Five day rotations staying in luxurious apartment-suites in BRU and flying perhaps six sectors in that time. 5 day trips that went something like Posn MUC, Operate MUC BCN. SBY. BCN MUC BCN early finish. SBY. Posn LTN on the early. Home for lunchtime! Eat lots of tapas. Drink lots of beer. Get to know Barcelona better than your own home! What a jolly! SBY for a day in CPH with only one flight passing trough was always a joy. LTN MGL LTN was sometimes a day's work! Home before lunchtime! Captains got suites in some hotels, great for crew parties but at what cost? I doubt anyone flew more than 300hrs in a year. Days spent cycling around Bavaria and eating Schnitzel. There was even a crew hire car there so on the early rotations it was possible to ski Kitzbuel in the afternooon! - it was the best holiday ever while it lasted. Best crews and party scene ever too, just a shame about the appallingly inept management.
Even so, the aircraft were well maintained and great fun to fly and commands came quickly. Good days.
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Perugia as a destination came about because the CEO, had some personal connections there. The schedules were awful, loads were low and like most of the other routes, were non money making.
It is alleged that the original Ops Manager was taking back-handers from the local crew transport company for months on the basis so much money was being spent moving crews around. He approved the contract and costs and probably thought "I'll have a slice of that". He was found out eventually though and given the Spanish Archer (El-Bow). His replacement was known to not mince his words with the likes of the CEO when things were going wrong with the schedules (daily problem) and I have it on good authority that one day in the Ops room when the CEO was trying to come up with ideas on how to crew flights (yes he tried), the then Ops Manager told him in no uncertain terms that clowns were not welcome in the department and to leave immediately if he wanted the aircraft to move the next day. Needless to say, said CEO scuttled away but to be replaced by another clueless boy wonder who was responsible for putting the schedules together in the first place. He too was given his marching orders by the OM.
Dealing with major disruption on a daily basis as well as dealing with heavily stressed ground staff were things most didn't sign up for.
Who would have thought Billy Smarts Circus had it's own airline !!
It is alleged that the original Ops Manager was taking back-handers from the local crew transport company for months on the basis so much money was being spent moving crews around. He approved the contract and costs and probably thought "I'll have a slice of that". He was found out eventually though and given the Spanish Archer (El-Bow). His replacement was known to not mince his words with the likes of the CEO when things were going wrong with the schedules (daily problem) and I have it on good authority that one day in the Ops room when the CEO was trying to come up with ideas on how to crew flights (yes he tried), the then Ops Manager told him in no uncertain terms that clowns were not welcome in the department and to leave immediately if he wanted the aircraft to move the next day. Needless to say, said CEO scuttled away but to be replaced by another clueless boy wonder who was responsible for putting the schedules together in the first place. He too was given his marching orders by the OM.
Dealing with major disruption on a daily basis as well as dealing with heavily stressed ground staff were things most didn't sign up for.
Who would have thought Billy Smarts Circus had it's own airline !!
Paxing All Over The World
DebonAir was useless. The poor crews. I am not surprised to read the background given by dc9-32 (above) and thank you for the info.
I started working a contract in MUC in September 1998 that lasted 18 months. I was pleased to discover Debon as I lived vey close to LTN. Very quickly I agreed with a colleague who also used them, "I'm a member of their Frequent Sufferer Programme". They were a disaster. Such a pity.
I only used them for about three round trips before changing to LH into LHR, long before they closed. Fortunately, iin those days, it was still possible to drop off and pause to collect for free.
I started working a contract in MUC in September 1998 that lasted 18 months. I was pleased to discover Debon as I lived vey close to LTN. Very quickly I agreed with a colleague who also used them, "I'm a member of their Frequent Sufferer Programme". They were a disaster. Such a pity.
I only used them for about three round trips before changing to LH into LHR, long before they closed. Fortunately, iin those days, it was still possible to drop off and pause to collect for free.
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The only guy that had any logic and balls in the last few months of Debonair was Joe Sharpes. Sadly, he too was up against the circus that being run on the first floor of "Portacabin Towers".
And much missed he was too when he left. I believe he was only hired (possibly only interested in) to get the thing set up and running. He was much respected and had he stayed there might have been a different mindset on the portacabin towers with that sort of leadership.
I doubt he'd have stood for one particularly corrosive character (previously mentioned above) who did much to destabilise flight-deck's self-esteem and confidence.
Who was Joe Sharpes? Don't recall the name. I thought there was a pretty good Flt Ops Dir in place for a while before the end.
I doubt he'd have stood for one particularly corrosive character (previously mentioned above) who did much to destabilise flight-deck's self-esteem and confidence.
Who was Joe Sharpes? Don't recall the name. I thought there was a pretty good Flt Ops Dir in place for a while before the end.
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I believe Joe Sharpes was bought in to replace the ex Royal Flight guy who held the DFO position. The Flight Ops department was effectively run by ex Military guys with no clue of commercial ops. Not helped when the original CEO was replaced by the guy who had personal contacts in Perugia. I believe when Debonair failed, this guy went off to run a Tea Shop in London. You couldn't make it up 