Meridiana is an airline based in Olbia, Italy. It is Italy's third largest airline operating domestic and European services, as well as intercontinental flights by its subsidiary Eurofly. Its headquarters are at Olbia - Costa Smeralda Airport, but the main hubs is at Cagliari-Elmas Airport. Meridiana holds smaller hubs at Catania-Fontanarossa Airport, Florence Airport, Olbia - Costa Smeralda Airport, Palermo International Airport and Verona Airport [1], and feeds into the bases of Eurofly at Milan Malpensa Airport and Rome Fiumicino Airport.
[edit] History
The airline was founded as Alisarda on March 29, 1963 by the Aga Khan, Prince Karīm al-Hussaynī, as an air-taxi and charter operator to promote tourism to Sardinia. Scheduled services began in 1964 from Olbia. In 1989, 35% of new stock was released to new shareholders to strengthen the company and the name Meridiana was adopted on 3 May 1991. The first international services were operated later in 1991 to Barcelona, Paris, London and Frankfurt. A 29.95% stake in Eurofly was acquired in December 2006. Meridiana is owned by Interprogramme (57.19%), SA AgaKhan (17.59%), employees (16.08%), Airfin (in liquidation) (4.51%), Fondazione Cariplo (3.39%) and other shareholders (1.24%). It has 1,358 employees (at March 2007).[1]
During 2004, Meridiana replaced four BAe 146-200s with four leased Airbus A319-100s, and has plans for a fifth. In January 2004 it was reported that Meridiana was planning to replace its McDonnell Douglas MD-82 fleet with 17 Airbus A320-200s.
In 2006 it transported over 4.6 million people, a 15.7% increase compared to 2005 figures.
[edit] Destinations
The Meridiana fleet (as of September 2009) [2]:
As of 5 January 2009 Meridiana's average fleet age was 17.1 years.[3]
[edit] References
[edit] External links
| Airlines of Italy | | | Current | |  | | | Defunct | | |
| Members of the International Air Transport Association | | | | | | Asia-Pacific regional office | | | | | | | China and North Asia regional office | | | | | | | | | | Latin America and the Caribbean regional office | | | | | | | Middle East and North Africa regional office | | | | | | | North America regional office | | | | | | | Russia and the CIS regional office | | | | | |
