Boarding an airliner before Covid-19 halted mass air travel, most people gave little thought to who owned the aircraft on which they were about to fly.
Most would have assumed it was the airliner they had booked their tickets with.
You might suppose the airliner is owned by the airline….
I didn’t know till Covid that these airlines ‘Code share’. Whilst having a look at the number of flights coming into Heathrow during the lockdown (Lagos to Heathrow chum? no problem – me, go down the pub,not on your life), I noticed there were flights from the same airport at the same time run by different airlines. You book with BA, fly with Delta etc.
Also, like the railways, the vehicles are owned by leasing companies not by the airlines.
Error aside, why though? You don’t assume the taxi you ride in is owned by the taxi driver. You don’t assume the building the restaurant is in is owned by the restaurant. Aircraft leasing companies make perfect sense – that’s how you handle surge needs across an industry. Some third party holds the excess capacity and is able to move it around as necessary.
Addolff, that’s caused by all the amalgamations of airlines in the last 15 years. So a KLM flight might also be Air France, Delta, Middle East Airlines, Alitalia etc
It’s a pirate RRRRR! It has already entered, the pillaging and plundering will follow shortly. 😉
Agammamon,
I wouldn’t assume the taxi cab is owned by the driver but by the taxi company, just like I wouldn’t assume the plane is owned by the pilot.
I assumed airlines owned their planes because I read about Emirates buying a million A380s or whatever.
Like most large airlines, Emirates operate on a mixture of fully-owned and leased aircraft.
In O’Leary’s early days, Ryanair made an absolute killing by buying large numbers of new 737s from Mr Boeing at an absolutely rock-bottom price and then selling them on a few years later for nearly what they’d paid for them. They still have relatively few leased aircraft.
“Error aside, why though?”
So Tovey and Foy can get their boring story in.
These airline changes from COVID will affect real people – An example I know for a fact that some Emirates A380 are leased. The leasing company are financed using money from UK insurers with the coupons going to pay annuities. Emirates is the only airline in the world not using RR engines in its A380 fleet. This means no other airline in the world is going to want those planes. The debt coupon is larger because of this. Thing is… what chance Emirates won’t want the planes in the long run? How in the hell will the leasing company be able to repay the loan if it’s got some worthless planes. Impact on insurer if debt not repaid £x00m. Current capital reserved for this £xm.
This will end in tears.
When I went to Japan a couple of years ago I went by SomeJapaneseAirline and had a SJA code on the ticket and departure board, but the vehicle I got on was painted with SomeMunichAirline on the side.
And British pilots and Japanese crew.
Anyone moderately familiar with the financial pages of a national newspaper would have run across many articles discussing the business of leasing aircraft to airlines.
Buy or lease?
Question has been around since time immemorial.
“Buy that which appreciates; lease that which depreciates.” – J. Paul Getty
If it flies, floats or fucks, lease it.
@Addolff
Have you been in a coma for last 30+ years?
Have you been in a coma for last 40+ years?
It’s Some owned by leasing & charter companies. In 80s I decided not to buy when BA and a Leasing Company floated
@Agammamon
Most taxis are owned by a driver who may rent them to other drivers
@Diogenes
‘Code share’ was prevalent in 1990s and before
eg SAS Edinburgh & Glasgow to Copenhagen & Malmo was same as and operated by British Midland