XL Airways Germany GmbH was a

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany (of or related to) ** Germania (historical use) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizens of Germany, see also German nationality law **Ge ...

charter airline Air charter is the business of renting an entire aircraft (i.e., chartering) as opposed to individual aircraft seats (i.e., purchasing a ticket through a traditional airline). Regulation Charter – also called air taxi or ad hoc – flights ...

headquartered in

Mörfelden-Walldorf Mörfelden-Walldorf is a town in the Groß-Gerau district, situated in the Frankfurt Rhine-Main region in the federal state (Bundesland) Hesse, Germany. Geography Location Mörfelden-Walldorf is situated within a triangle formed by the South He ...

Hesse Hesse (, , ) or Hessia (, ; german: Hessen ), officially the State of Hessen (german: links=no, Land Hessen), is a state in Germany. Its capital city is Wiesbaden, and the largest urban area is Frankfurt. Two other major historic cities are Dar ...

, operating charter and ad-hoc lease services, mostly out of

Frankfurt Airport Frankfurt Airport (; german: link=no, Flughafen Frankfurt Main , also known as ''Rhein-Main-Flughafen'') is a major international airport located in Frankfurt, the fifth-largest city of Germany and one of the world's leading financial centres ...

. The airline belonged, together with now defunct

XL Airways France XL Airways France was a French airline with its head offices on the grounds of Paris-Charles de Gaulle Airport. It operated scheduled flights mainly to long-haul destinations in Africa, the Middle East, the United States and the Caribbean as wel ...

, to

ALMC hf ALMC hf., formerly Straumur Investment Bank hf. ( is, Straumur Fjárfestingabanki), is a regional investment bank headquartered in Reykjavík, Iceland. Founded in 1986 as ''Hlutabréfasjóðurinn'' and rebranded as Straumur in 2004, the bank in ...

(formerly ''Straumur Investment Bank'') from

Iceland Iceland ( is, Ísland; ) is a Nordic island country in the North Atlantic Ocean and in the Arctic Ocean. Iceland is the most sparsely populated country in Europe. Iceland's capital and largest city is Reykjavík, which (along with its s ...

History

The airline was founded as Star XL German Airlines by

Eimskip Eimskipafélag Íslands hf. is an international shipping company with 55 offices in 20 countries and four continents; Europe, North America, South America and Asia. Eimskip specializes in worldwide freight forwarding services with focus on frozen ...

from

and received its

air Operator's Certificate An air operator's certificate (AOC) is the approval granted by a civil aviation authority (CAA) to an aircraft operator to allow it to use aircraft for commercial purposes. This requires the operator to have personnel, assets, and system in plac ...

on 3 May 2006. On 30 October of the same year, the Avion leisure business was bought out and re-organized by the XL Leisure Group, resulting in the airline changing its name to ''XL Airways Germany''. On 11 September 2008,

BBC News Channel BBC News (also known as the BBC News Channel) is a British free-to-air public broadcast television news channel for BBC News. It was launched as BBC News 24 on 9 November 1997 at 5:30 pm as part of the BBC's foray into digital domestic telev ...

reported that XL Leisure Group had filed for administration due to rising fuel prices, although initially

Simon Calder Simon Calder (born 25 December 1955) is a freelance UK travel journalist and broadcaster. He works for various news and travel publications as well as being travel correspondent for ''The Independent''. Biography In 1962, Calder joined the Wo ...

confirmed the group's website was still taking bookings, the group folded the next morning. Operations of the German and French airline subsidiaries were not affected, however. On 12 September 2008, Straumur Investment Bank acquired XL Airways Germany and its French sister company, XL Airways France. The company filed for bankruptcy on 27 December 2012; operations for the winter season had already been suspended on 14 December. The company officially closed on 3 January 2013.

Destinations

Airbus A320-214, XL Airways Germany JP6291806

XL Airways Germany served the following destinations in December 2012:

Fleet

Fleet at airline's closing

As of December 2012, the XL Airways Germany fleet consisted of the following aircraft:XL Airways fleet list at planespotters.net
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Formerly operated

Previously, the fleet consisted of the following aircraft:

Accidents and incidents

*On 27 November 2008, while executing

XL Airways Germany Flight 888T XL Airways Germany Flight 888T (GXL888T) was an acceptance flight for an Airbus A320 on 27 November 2008. The aircraft crashed into the Mediterranean Sea, off Canet-en-Roussillon on the French coast, close to the Spanish border, killing all s ...

, an

Airbus A320-200 Airbus SE (; ; ; ) is a European multinational aerospace corporation. Airbus designs, manufactures and sells civil and military aerospace products worldwide and manufactures aircraft throughout the world. The company has three divisions: '' ...

registered to XL Airways Germany crashed into the Mediterranean Sea near

Canet-en-Roussillon Canet-en-Roussillon (; ca, Canet de Rosselló, ; oc, Canet de Rosselhon, ) is a commune and town in the French department of the Pyrénées-Orientales, administrative region of Occitania. Geography Canet-en-Roussillon is located in the ca ...

on the French coast. The plane was owned by

Air New Zealand Air New Zealand Limited () is the flag carrier airline of New Zealand. Based in Auckland, the airline operates scheduled passenger flights to 20 domestic and 30 international destinations in 18 countries, primarily around and within the Pacif ...

and leased to XL Airways Germany registered as D-AXLA (formerly ZK-OJL), and was undertaking a technical flight immediately prior to a scheduled handover back to Air New Zealand. At the time of the accident the plane was painted in Air New Zealand livery. All seven people on board — two Germans (captain Norbert Kaeppel and first officer Theodore Ketzer from XL Airways) and five New Zealanders (one pilot, three aircraft engineers and one member of the

Civil Aviation Authority of New Zealand The Civil Aviation Authority of New Zealand (CAA; Māori: ''Te Mana Rererangi Tūmatanui o Aotearoa'') is the government agency tasked with establishing civil aviation safety and security standards in New Zealand. The CAA also monitors adherence ...

) - were killed.

References

External links

Official website
{{Airlines of Germany Defunct airlines of Germany Airlines established in 2006 Airlines disestablished in 2013 German companies disestablished in 2013 German companies established in 2006