NORWEGIAN AIR SHUTTLE

'Norwegian Air Shuttle' () is a Norwegian low-cost airline, with headquarters at Fornebu outside Oslo and its main base at Oslo Airport, Gardermoen. Norwegian Air Shuttle is also referred to as 'Norwegian', which is the company's commercial brand.^[1] It operates low-cost flights in Scandinavia and in Europe.^[2]
The airline operates a fleet of 22 Boeing 737-300 aircraft. Its operational centres are in Oslo and Bergen and its technical center is at Stavanger Airport, Sola.

Contents

History

Operations

Destinations

New Routes

Fleet

External links

References

History

The airline was formed as Busy Bee Airservice in 1967. Between 1972 and 1983 it operated as Air Executive Norway and reformed as Norwegian Air Shuttle in 1993, starting operations in January 1993. In September 2002 it adopted the brand name Norwegian to concentrate on domestic low-cost operations.
Norwegian Air Shuttle (NAS) was founded in 1993 on the ruins of the bankruptcy of Busy Bee to continue the wet-leased regional flights on Braathens S.A.F.Es network on the Norwegian West Coast, serving Bergen, Haugesund, Kristiansund, Molde, Stavanger and Trondheim. The airline inherited three Fokker 50 aircraft from Busy Bee, but later also acquired three more aircraft.
The contract with Braathens expired in October 2003, when Braathens new owner SAS started using its fleet of Fokker 50 aircraft previously operated in Northern Norway under the SAS Commuter Norlink brand, to fly on the routes on the West Coast. But even before this the airline started some operations outside Braathens, including the previously Braathens contracted route from Stavanger to Newcastle, as well as the public service obligation from Bodø and Tromsø to Andøya, which they operated until January 1, 2003.
From 1 September 2002 the airline rebranded as Norwegian and started domestic flights as a low-cost carrier with six leased Boeing 737-300 aircraft, on the routes Oslo-Bergen, Oslo-Trondheim, Oslo-Tromsø and a week later on Oslo-Stavanger. For the first few months Norwegian had to wet lease three aircraft. Since then Norwegian has expanded considerably, offering a total of 55 destinations and 84 routes.
Norwegian was noted on Oslo Stock Exchange on 18 December 2004, with the ticker NAS. The largest owner is CEO Bjørn Kjos, who owns about one third of the company. In 2005 Norwegian Air Shuttle made a profit for the first time since Boeing 737 operations started in 2002.
Lately the airline has opened a second hub, at Warsaw Frederic Chopin Airport in Poland, flying to Central European destinations. There are 2 Boeing 737 operating from Warsaw^[3].
Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA announced April 24 2007 that they have bought 100% of the Swedish low cost airline FlyNordic. This makes Norwegian Scandinavia's largest low cost airline. As a result of Finnair's ownership in FlyNordic, Finnair now owns 5% of Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA.^[4]
On August 23 2007, Norwegian announced that it will initiate scheduled operations February 18 2008 from the new civilian airport Moss Airport, Rygge south of Oslo^[5]. Rygge is a military airport which will open for commercial traffic in October 2007, and will initially offer only charter flights. Lying approximately at the same distance from Oslo as the main airport Gardermoen, Rygge will probably become a strong alternative to Gardermoen, and a better alternative for the around 260 000 people^[6] living in Østfold county. Norwegian's inital 14 scheduled routes from Rygge will go to Alicante, Athens, Barcelona, Belgrade, Bergen, Budapest, Istanbul, London, Málaga, Marrakech, Palanga/Klaipéda, Szczecin, Valencia and Warsaw. According to a statement made to Aftenposten by Norwegian ^[7], the prices for flights from Rygge will generally be cheaper than those from Gardermoen.

Operations

Their market share varies on the different routes, but the Oslo-Trondheim and Oslo-Bergen routes had the highest market share in 2005 with 37%.
The airline has code sharing agreements with FlyNordic (which it now owns) on the Oslo-Stockholm route, with Rossiya on the Oslo-St. Petersburg route, and with Sterling on most of their shared routes (Oslo-Copenhagen, Oslo-Nice, Oslo-Prague and more).
Norwegian does not own its own handling services. Only light maintenance are done by own employees. Heavy maintenance (C/D checks) and engine maintenance are put out on tender. The airline is a member of European Low Fares Airline Association (ELFAA).

Destinations

Main articles: Norwegian Air Shuttle destinations

New Routes

★ Oslo - Istanbul [seasonal]

★ Bergen - Alicante [seasonal]

★ Trondheim - Alicante [seasonal]

★ Stavanger - Alicante [seasonal]

★ Oslo - Moscow-Domodedovo

★ Munich - Warsaw [starts October 28 ,2007]

★ Oslo - London-Gatwick [starts October 28, 2007]

★ Oslo - Tenerife [starts October 28 ,2007]

★ Oslo – Szczecin [starts October 30, 2007]

★ Oslo - Las Palmas [starts October 31,2007]

★ Stavanger - Warsaw [starts October 31, 2007]

★ Salzburg - Warsaw [starts December 29,2007]

★ Marrakech - Menara International Airport [starts November 2007]

Fleet

Norwegian Boeing 737-300 LN-KKP ''Kirsten Flagstad''

As of December 2006 the Norwegian Air Shuttle fleet consists of 23 Boeing 737-300^[8]. All the planes have 148 seats in one class. All but two aircraft are leased.
The company's aircraft livery is white with a red nose. Most aircraft have a picture of a well-known Norwegian on the tail.

Aircraft	Registration	Tail art
Boeing 737-300	LN-KKB	All white livery
	LN-KKC
	LN-KKD
	LN-KKF	Fridtjof Nansen
	LN-KKG	Gidsken Jakobsen
	LN-KKH	Otto Sverdrup
	LN-KKI	None (previously Helge Ingstad)
	LN-KKJ	Sonja Henie
	LN-KKL	Roald Amundsen
	LN-KKM	Thor Heyerdal
	LN-KKN	Sigrid Undset
	LN-KKO	Henrik Ibsen
	LN-KKP	None (previously Kirsten Flagstad)
	LN-KKQ	Alf Prøysen
	LN-KKR
	LN-KKS	Edvard Munch
	LN-KKT	Self promotion
	LN-KKU
	LN-KKV	Niels Henrik Abel
	LN-KKW
	LN-KKX	Logojet advertising for Network Norway
	LN-KKY	ACTA logojet
	LN-KKZ	Logo jet advertising for the insurance company Silver

Norwegian is currently wetleasing one Airbus A320 from XL-France until February 2008.
On August 30 2007 Norwegian ordered 42 new Boeing 737-800 aircraft with an option for 42 more, an order with a total worh of $3.1 billion^[9]. The planes will enter the fleet between 2009 and 2014, approximately 10 each year.

External links

★ Norwegian Air Shuttle

★ Official route map

★ Official route map, Interactive

★ Scanair on NAS

References

1. About Norwegian
2. Directory: World Airlines
3. Quartely report 3rd quarter 2006
4. Norwegian to strengthen Scandinavian network with FlyNordic acquisition ATW Daily News, April 25, 2007.
5. Aftenposten: Norwegian Air plans new southeast hub
6. Population by sex, age and municipality. Østfold. 1 January 2007
7. Aftenposten: Rygge success for Norwegian (Norwegian)
8. Norwegian's fleet
9. Reuters: Norwegian Air places .1 bln Boeing order