Lauda Air

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Lauda redirects here. For the former F1 racing driver, and founder of Lauda Air, see Niki Lauda.

Lauda Air

IATA NG	ICAO LDA	Callsign Lauda Air
Founded		1979
Hubs		Vienna International Airport
Fleet size		14
Destinations		130 in 66 countries (AUA)
Parent company		Austrian Airlines Group
Headquarters		Vienna, Austria
Key people		Niki Lauda (founder)
Website: http://www.laudaair.com

Lauda Air is an airline based in Vienna, Austria. It operates leisure flights to destinations in Europe, North Africa and the Caribbean. Its main base is Vienna International Airport ^[1]. Together with Austrian Airlines and Austrian Arrows, Lauda Air belongs to the Austrian Airlines Group.

1 History
2 Services
3 Incidents and accidents
4 Fleet
5 References
6 External links

[edit] History

Lauda Air was established in April 1979 by former Formula One world motor racing champion Niki Lauda and started operations in 1985, initially operating charter and air taxi services. Scheduled operations were licenced in 1987 ^[1]. In 1989 Lauda started their first long-haul flights from Vienna to Sydney and Melbourne, via Bangkok. In the 1990s they started to fly their Sydney and Melbourne flights via Kuala Lumpur. Daily flights to Miami via Munich, to Dubai and to Cuba followed.^{[citation needed]}

In 2003, Austrian Airlines bought out the remainder of Lauda's stake. In 2005 the flight operation merged with Austrian Airlines, and the label "Lauda Air" now operates charter flights within the Austrian Airlines Group.

Niki Lauda has since started a new airline, Niki, whereas Austrian Airlines Group will take the decision of whether to integrate the whole Lauda Air Charter Flight fleet into the common Austrian-design or not in early 2007 because of the aim to appear as one airline group (simplicity) and in order to avoid advertisement for Niki Lauda's new airline, Niki. This would mean the total disappearance of Lauda Air.^{[citation needed]}

[edit] Services

At an Austrian Airlines board meeting in November 2006 plans were approved to retire the Airbus wide-bodied fleet by mid-2007, to concentrate on a Boeing 767 and Boeing 777 fleet. As`a result of subsequent fleet cuts Austrian was suspending some long-haul services and Laudas Air is to withdraw from the long-haul charter market over the next year ^[2].