Astraeus Limited, trading as Astraeus Airlines, was a British

airline An airline is a company that provides civil aviation, air transport services for traveling passengers and freight. Airlines use aircraft to supply these services and may form partnerships or Airline alliance, alliances with other airlines for ...

based at Astraeus House in

Crawley Crawley () is a large town and borough in West Sussex, England. It is south of London, north of Brighton and Hove, and north-east of the county town of Chichester. Crawley covers an area of and had a population of 106,597 at the time of th ...

West Sussex West Sussex is a county in South East England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the shire districts of Adur, Arun, Chichester, Horsham, and Mid Sussex, and the boroughs of Crawley and Worthing. Covering an ar ...

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. Founded in 2002, and named after the Greek God of the dusk, it entered

administration Administration may refer to: Management of organizations * Management, the act of directing people towards accomplishing a goal ** Administrative assistant, Administrative Assistant, traditionally known as a Secretary, or also known as an admini ...

on 21 November 2011, ceasing operations the same day. Established as a charter airline, Astraeus changed its business model in May 2008 and ceased full-time charter and scheduled service flying to concentrate on sublease activities. Astraeus provided aircraft anywhere in the world to meet short and long-term lease requirements, with

wet lease Aircraft leases are leases used by airlines and other aircraft operators. Airlines lease aircraft from other airlines or leasing companies for two main reasons: to operate aircraft without the financial burden of buying them, and to provide tempora ...

, damp lease or

dry lease Aircraft leases are leases used by airlines and other aircraft operators. Airlines lease aircraft from other airlines or leasing companies for two main reasons: to operate aircraft without the financial burden of buying them, and to provide tempora ...

options. The main base was

London Gatwick Airport Gatwick Airport (), also known as London Gatwick , is a major international airport near Crawley, West Sussex, England, south of Central London. In 2021, Gatwick was the third-busiest airport by total passenger traffic in the UK, after Hea ...

. Astraeus Airlines also had a history of providing ad hoc capacity to various clients. This included sports charters (

Manchester United Manchester () is a city in Greater Manchester, England. It had a population of 552,000 in 2021. It is bordered by the Cheshire Plain to the south, the Pennines to the north and east, and the neighbouring city of City of Salford, Salford to ...

Arsenal An arsenal is a place where arms and ammunition are made, maintained and repaired, stored, or issued, in any combination, whether privately or publicly owned. Arsenal and armoury (British English) or armory (American English) are mostly ...

, UK and

Irish Irish may refer to: Common meanings * Someone or something of, from, or related to: ** Ireland, an island situated off the north-western coast of continental Europe ***Éire, Irish language name for the isle ** Northern Ireland, a constituent unit ...

FA and many others), military charters, show business charters (

Disney The Walt Disney Company, commonly known as Disney (), is an American multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate headquartered at the Walt Disney Studios complex in Burbank, California. Disney was originally founded on October ...

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), various government contracts and general charters for the leisure and business industry. Astraeus Limited held a

United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority The Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) is the statutory corporation which oversees and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the United Kingdom. Its areas of responsibility include: * Supervising the issuing of pilots' licences, testing of e ...

Type A Operating Licence and was therefore permitted to carry passengers, cargo and mail on aircraft with 20 or more seats. Astraeus Airlines was an

IOSA The IATA Operational Safety Audit (IOSA) programme is an internationally recognised and accepted evaluation system designed to assess the operational management and control systems of an airline. IOSA uses internationally recognised quality audit ...

registered company with the

International Air Transport Association The International Air Transport Association (IATA ) is a trade association of the world's airlines founded in 1945. IATA has been described as a cartel since, in addition to setting technical standards for airlines, IATA also organized tariff ...

History

Astraeus Airlines commenced charter operations in 2002 with

Boeing 737 The Boeing 737 is a narrow-body aircraft produced by Boeing at its Renton Factory in Washington. Developed to supplement the Boeing 727 on short and thin routes, the twinjet retains the 707 fuselage width and six abreast seating with two un ...

aircraft and also operated under the Flystar brand for a short time. After establishing itself as a reliable charter carrier to UK leisure tour operators for both summer and winter seasons, the fleet was extended in 2004 to include

Boeing 757 The Boeing 757 is an American narrow-body airliner designed and built by Boeing Commercial Airplanes. The then-named 7N7, a twinjet successor for the 727 (a trijet), received its first orders in August 1978. The prototype completed its mai ...

aircraft. By 2008 the fleet had grown to two Boeing 737-300s, two Boeing 737-700s and five Boeing 757-200s. As of 2009, Astraeus Airlines was the only airline charter company which remained based at Gatwick Airport, and grew its fleet, adding a Boeing 737-500 and 737-700. Astraeus was a 100%-owned subsidiary of Eignarhaldsfelagid Fengur hf, an Icelandic-based travel group that also owned the Iceland Express airline. Astraeus ended operations on 21 November 2011 and entered

. The airline cited a lack of contracts for the winter of 2011 and some "extremely bad luck" with technical issues as reasons for ending operations.

Destinations

Fleet

In November 2011, the Astraeus fleet consisted of the following aircraft with an average age of 17.4 years: Astraeus RZ

Astraeus and Iron Maiden

The heavy metal band Iron Maiden lead singer

Bruce Dickinson Paul Bruce Dickinson (born 7 August 1958) is an English singer who has been the lead vocalist of the heavy metal band Iron Maiden from 1981 to 1993 and 1999–present. He is known for his wide-ranging operatic vocal style and energetic stage ...

was a captain for Astraeus, flying the Boeing 757 aircraft when not performing with the band. Dickinson was also Astraeus's Marketing Director. Dickinson has flown many high-profile flights for Astraeus: for example, on 20 October 2010, he flew the

Liverpool F.C. Liverpool Football Club is a professional football club based in Liverpool, England. The club competes in the Premier League, the top tier of English football. Founded in 1892, the club joined the Football League the following year and has p ...

team to

Naples Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical re ...

, for their

European Cup The UEFA Champions League (abbreviated as UCL, or sometimes, UEFA CL) is an annual club football competition organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA) and contested by top-division European clubs, deciding the competit ...

match against

Napoli Naples (; it, Napoli ; nap, Napule ), from grc, Νεάπολις, Neápolis, lit=new city. is the regional capital of Campania and the third-largest city of Italy, after Rome and Milan, with a population of 909,048 within the city's adminis ...

Iron Maiden Iron Maiden are an English heavy metal band formed in Leyton, East London, in 1975 by bassist and primary songwriter Steve Harris. While fluid in the early years of the band, the lineup for most of the band's history has consisted of Harri ...

commissioned an Astraeus 757 as transport for their

Somewhere Back in Time ''Somewhere Back in Time - The Best of: 1980 - 1989'' is a best of release by the British heavy metal band Iron Maiden, containing a selection of songs originally recorded for their first eight albums (including ''Live After Death''). Backgroun ...

tour in 2008 and nicknamed it Ed Force One, flown by the lead singer Dickinson himself. The aircraft was converted into a combi configuration, repainted with an Iron Maiden livery and was used in this scheme until 28 May 2008. The same aircraft (G-OJIB) was used again on the second leg of the Somewhere Back in Time tour in 2009. The aircraft was also meant to be used for

The Final Frontier World Tour The Final Frontier World Tour was a concert tour by Iron Maiden in support of the band's 15th album, ''The Final Frontier'', which began on 9 June 2010 in Dallas and ended in London, England on 6 August 2011. The tour was announced on the band' ...

in 2011; however on 8 February 2011 another 757-200 aircraft (G-STRX) departed

Southend Southend-on-Sea (), commonly referred to as Southend (), is a coastal city and unitary authority area with borough status in southeastern Essex, England. It lies on the north side of the Thames Estuary, east of central London. It is bordered ...

with a sightly differing Iron Maiden livery for the tour.

References

External links