LTU
| LTU International Airways | |
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| IATA code : | LT |
| ICAO code : | LTU |
| Call sign : | LTU |
| Founding: | 1955 |
| Operation stopped: | 2009 |
| Merged with: | air Berlin |
| Seat: |
Dusseldorf , Germany
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| Home airport : | Dusseldorf Airport |
| Company form: | GmbH |
| Management: | Helmut Weixler |
| Number of employees: | almost 2,800 (2007) |
| Sales: | € 1.06 billion (2006) |
| Passenger volume: | 5.7 million (2006) |
| Frequent Flyer Program : | topbonus (until 2007 LTU Redpoints ) |
| Fleet size: | 23 (operated for Air Berlin ) |
| Aims: | National and international (for Air Berlin) |
| LTU International Airways merged with Air Berlin in 2009 . The information in italics relates to the last status before the takeover. | |
LTU International Airways (from L uft t ransport u nunternehmen ) was a German airline based in Düsseldorf and based at Düsseldorf Airport . It was taken over in 2007 by Air Berlin , which stopped using the LTU brand in summer 2009 and from then on had all flights operated under the Air Berlin brand . With the integration into the Air Operator Certificate of Air Berlin in April 2011, LTU was finally dissolved.
On October 27, 2017, Air Berlin finally ceased its flight operations.
history
Foundation and first years
The LTU was re-established on October 20, 1955 under the name "Lufttransport-Union" in Frankfurt am Main , after the LTU (Lufttransport Union) was first founded in 1955 by the Englishman Bernard G. Dromgoole. In order to obtain a German operating license, the German building contractor Kurt Conle from Mülheim an der Ruhr was called in as a further partner, who is now often incorrectly named as the company founder.
The first flight took place on March 2, 1956 and led from Frankfurt to the Sicilian city of Catania. In the first few years, the number of passengers was a few hundred per year. The fleet at that time consisted of several Vickers Viking aircraft.
These were among others:
- D-ADAM Vickers 610 Viking 1B - bought December 28, 1955 from BEA (G-AIVD), sold to Balair (HB-AAR) in July 1957
- D-ABEL / BALI Vickers 610 Viking 1B - bought on December 28, 1955 from First Air Trading (G-AIVI), sold on February 4, 1961, start-up accident in Düsseldorf / Germany
- D-ABIR / BONA Vickers 610 Viking 1B - bought December 28, 1955 by Overseas Aviation (G-AIVJ), sold to Aviameer (OO-EEN) on April 28, 1958
- D-AGID Vickers 610 Viking 1B - bought on February 13, 1957 from Aero Express (D-CABO), sale failed
- D-AMOR / BABY Vickers 610 Viking Mk. 2 - bought February 13, 1957 by Dragon Airways (G-AOCH), sold to Air Ferry (G-AOCH) on August 15, 1963
- D-AIDA / BETA Vickers 610 Viking 1A - bought on April 10, 1957 from Eagle Aviation (G-AGRR), sold on April 14, 1958 to Aero Transport Flugbetriebs AG (OE-FAT)
In 1956, the Lufttransport-Union renamed itself “LTU” (Air Transport Company) to prevent confusion with a company of the same name. The company has been based in Düsseldorf since January 1st, 1960. The managing directors were EJ Ahrens and Wolfgang Krauss. LTU later also operated three Fokker Friendships , one of which was the initial purchase of this aircraft type with the aircraft registration D-BAKI . They also flew a De Havilland DH.104 Dove , which today appears at air shows for the company in keeping with the tradition. A Bristol 170 was also used between 1957 and 1960 and a total of two Douglas DC-4s from 1958 to 1960 .
LTU in the jet age
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Was the first jet of a line of Finnair derived Sud Aviation Caravelle III, and 1970, the Fokker F28 Fellowship, a short-range commercial aircraft (65 passengers) of the Dutch aircraft manufacturer Fokker . The Caravelle III was replaced by the Caravelle 10R in 1968. Since 1969 only jet planes have been used. These types of aircraft were soon to be replaced by the Lockheed L-1011 TriStar . The first wide-body aircraft of this type was delivered to LTU on May 29, 1973. It was followed by the Boeing 757 , Boeing 767 and McDonnell Douglas MD-11 TriJet . From 1992 to 1993 LTU used a Boeing 747-212B leased from Evergreen , which previously flew for Singapore Airlines and PanAm , among others , to bridge delivery delays on the MD-11 . In 1995, the conversion of the entire fleet to Airbus began .
Expansion in the 1980s
As early as 1964, “Transair LTU” started operating as a tour operator. This was followed by the founding of " Meier's Weltreisen " (1980) - namesake was Norbert Meier, former station manager of "Air France" (1967/68?) At Düsseldorf Airport as the new managing director of "Meier's Weltreisen" - as well as the takeover of " Tjaereborg " ( 1981), " Jahn Reisen " (1986), "Marlboro Reisen" and "THR Tours" (here, too, later Norbert Meier directed again). These merged in 1996 under the umbrella of the newly founded "LTU Touristik GmbH", but were continued as independent brands. In 1983 LTS - Lufttransport Süd was founded and renamed "LTU-Süd" in 1987. LTU-Süd in Munich had three Boeing 757s with a total of 597 seats. In 1987 the Spanish subsidiary LTE - LuftTransport Espana was founded on Mallorca . "LTC - LuftTransport Catering" started operations at Düsseldorf Airport in 1988. Until the late 1980s, the Conle family was the sole owner of the airline. In 1989 the WestLB was sold a 34 percent stake in the company.
Development in the 1990s
In 1998, 61% belonged to the Conle family, 32% to WestLB and 5% to the Graebner family. In 2000 the Conle family finally withdrew from the business. The owner was LoMa Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH from Cologne, a wholly owned subsidiary of Rewe-Zentralfinanz eG. The Swiss SAirGroup then took over 49.9 percent of the LTU shares. After Swissair went bankrupt in October 2001, the Rewe Group acquired the shares in addition to its own 40 percent. Due to financial difficulties of LTU, the Düsseldorf law firm Metzeler-van Betteray managed the 49.9% share in trust. Rewe initially looked unsuccessfully for a new investor for the airline.
Development in the 2000s
In 2001 the company slipped into the red, among other things due to the bankruptcy of SAirGroup and the decline in passenger numbers after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 , and could only be saved by a state guarantee, which was taken over by WestLB .
On February 17, 2006, Intro Verwaltungsgesellschaft mbH (at that time the main owner of dba ) announced that it was joining LTU. The main owner of the intro, Hans Rudolf Wöhrl , had acquired the 49.9 percent managed in trust and a further 10.1 percent from the Cologne-based corporation CKA . In March 2006, Wöhrl gave up his majority stake by selling parts to the LTU management. According to this, 24 percent were with the LTU management spokesman Jürgen Marbach , 36 percent with Hans Rudolf Wöhrl and 40 percent with Rewe. On June 1, 2006, Rewe gave up its 40% stake in the company. Wöhrl temporarily increased his stake to 76 percent, but gave some of it to Jürgen Marbach, spokesman for the LTU management. The LTU parent company LoMa-Beteiligungsgesellschaft mbH belonged to 55% of Intro Verwaltungsgesellschaft GmbH from Nuremberg owned by Hans Rudolf Wöhrl and 45% to "Marbach Beteiligungs und Consulting GmbH" (MIC) from Meerbusch owned by Jürgen Marbach.
On its way away from the charter plane to the scheduled airline, the LTU changed its appearance in April 2007. The outdated red was retained, but the color white dominated the new LTU livery.
Takeover by Air Berlin
In March 2007 Air Berlin announced the takeover of LTU. The completion of the transaction was subject to approval by the Federal Cartel Office. The approval was granted in early August 2007 without any conditions. The total purchase price including the assumption of debts in the amount of 200 million euros was 340 million euros. The narrow-body aircraft were gradually painted in the colors of Air Berlin, while the wide-body aircraft continued to operate under the name LTU. This was later softened by the fact that all scheduled flights were operated under the Air Berlin brand and only the long-distance tourist routes were operated under the LTU name.
At the end of February 2008, Jürgen Marbach resigned from the LTU management.
attitude
Air Berlin announced in July 2008 that the LTU brand would no longer be used, which was implemented by the summer of 2009 - since then the company has operated in its public image exclusively in the name and as part of Air Berlin. The remaining machines were gradually repainted, and LTU's independent website was also discontinued.
On April 1, 2011, the employment relationships of the entire LTU staff were transferred to Air Berlin by transfer of operations. In addition, only the Air Berlin Air Operator Certificate was used for all flights carried out .
Destinations
After the takeover by Air Berlin, LTU served various routes in the Air Berlin flight plan using the wet lease procedure, whereby the name LTU was only visible to the customer through a small sticker "operated by LTU" on some, but not all, aircraft . All long-haul destinations were served exclusively by LTU, as it had ETOPS rights and was therefore allowed to fly certain additional intercontinental routes. Long-haul aircraft of the types Airbus A330-200 and -300 were used. After the dissolution of the LTU, the remaining aircraft were taken over by Air Berlin.
fleet
Before the takeover into the fleet and the Air Operator Certificate (AOC) of Air Berlin, the LTU fleet as of February 2011 consisted of 24 aircraft with an average age of 8.8 years:
All aircraft were operated exclusively in the name and branding of the parent company Air Berlin. As of April 2011, there are no more aircraft registered on LTU.
The term "LTU" has since disappeared from the aircraft. Until May 2009, four of the A330-200s with the aircraft registration numbers D-ALPA to D-ALPD had a mixed solution in which the Air Berlin color scheme was combined with the lettering “LTU” on the side and on the tail unit or “LTU.com” on the lower side of the fuselage was. The last aircraft with the classic LTU livery left Düsseldorf Airport on August 16, 2009 when it flew to Abu Dhabi for repainting . Until airberlin ceased flight operations in October 2017, all aircraft had the livery and the Air Berlin name.
Incidents
- On February 4, 1961, a Vickers Viking 1B of the LTU ( aircraft registration D-BALI ) skidded at the start of a cargo flight at Düsseldorf Airport and grazed the hut of the ILS transmitter. The three crew members survived, with two pilots being slightly injured. However, the aircraft suffered a total loss.
- On June 28, 1991, a Lockheed L-1011 TriStar from LTU (registration number: D-AERI ) burned out in Düsseldorf during cleaning after maintenance work. There were no deaths or injuries, but the machine was completely destroyed.
See also
literature
- Josef Krauthäuser and Ulrich Kappner: Flying is there for everyone: From the Vickers Viking to the Airbus A 330 - The history of LTU . NARA-Verlag, Allershausen 1996.
- LTU review - 5 decades of joie de vivre . Ed. Of ok! Communication, Mülheim an der Ruhr 2005.
- Jens Roepstorff: 50 years of LTU - a success story with Mülheim participation , Mülheimer Jahrbuch 2006, pp. 83–86.
- LTU (Ed.): 20 years of LTU. Anniversary publication, Düsseldorf, November 1975.
Web links
- Web presence of the parent company Air Berlin - The LTU's own website no longer exists.
- LTU-Flugzeuge.de - Private website with data on the aircraft used
- Report of the EU Commission on the restructuring of the LTU (PDF file; 325 kB)
- LTU on Planespotters.net
Individual evidence
- ↑ Cartel Office - Air Berlin is allowed to swallow LTU holiday fliers. In: sueddeutsche.de. August 8, 2007, accessed November 25, 2011 .
- ↑ a b aero.de: Air Berlin stopped using the LTU brand ( Memento from February 15, 2009 in the Internet Archive ) July 29, 2008
- ↑ a b aero.de - Air Berlin completes integration of LTU April 1, 2011
- ↑ Save a Viking ( Memento from November 20, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) Website of the Swiss organization "Save a Viking"
- ↑ RP-Online.de: dba boss Wöhrl gives up majority at LTU again (April 28, 2006)
- ↑ Süddeutsche Zeitung : Air Berlin may swallow LTU holiday fliers (August 8, 2007)
- ↑ Air Berlin press review ( page no longer available , search in web archives ) Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ↑ derwesten.de: LTU: Jürgen Marbach takes off ( Memento from September 28, 2008 in the Internet Archive ) (February 28, 2008)
- ↑ a b ch-aviation.ch - LTU fleet ( Memento from March 15, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) (English) accessed on February 24, 2011
- ↑ airfleets.net - LTU fleet age (English) accessed on February 24, 2011
- ↑ Josef Krauthäuser and Ulrich Kappner: Flying is there for everyone: From the Vickers Viking to the Airbus A 330. The history of LTU . NARA-Verlag, Allershausen 1996. ISBN 3-925671-21-8 , p. 18 and p. 145.
- ^ Accident report Viking 1B D-BALI , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on December 8, 2017.
- ↑ accident report L.1011 D-AERI , Aviation Safety Network (English), accessed on 8 December 2017th
