Air France

Air France (AFR, Compagnie Nationale Air France) is the national airline of France. The company transported 43.3 million passengers and earned 12.53 billion Euro in revenues between April 2001 and March 2002. It has routes to 296 cities in 85 countries and employs over 64,000 people. It is part of the Skyteam Alliance with Delta, Aeromexico, Korean Air, Czech Airlines and Alitalia.

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Air France Airbus A320 (F-GJVE)
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Air France Airbus A320 (F-GFKM)
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Air France Boeing 747
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Air France has the IATA designation AF.

The company fleet consists of around 240 aircraft, 100 from Boeing (mainly long haul) and 141 from Airbus. Five Concordes were withdrawn from use early in 2003.

Founded on August 30, 1933 through the merger of Air Orient, Compagnie Générale Aéropostale, Société Générale de Transport Aérien (SGTA, the first French carrier, founded as Lignes Aériennes Farman in 1919), Air Union and CIDNA (Compagnie Internationale de Navigation). The airline had extensive routes across Europe, but also to French colonies in northern Africa and elsewhere.

The company was nationalized in 1946, Compagnie Nationale Air France was created by an parliamentary act on June 16, 1948. The government held 70% of the new company and still (mid-2002) holds a 54% stake in the airline.

In 1949 the company was one of the founders of SITA (Société Internationale de Télécommunications Aéronautiques). The airline used the De Havilland Comet for a short while from 1953, but soon replaced them with Viscounts and in 1959 the company started widespread use of the elegant twin-jet Sud Aviation Caravelle. It graduated to the use of Boeing aircraft, but as a national European carrier it became committed to Airbus designs from 1974. First available in 1976, the airline operated the unique Concorde SST supersonic airliner, using it on the Paris-Charles de Gaulle to New York route as well as a number of other routes (those other routes were dropped in 1982).

Hijackings: 1973 Marseille; 1976 Benghazi (Entebbe) and Ho Chi Minh City; 1977 Benghazi; 1983 Geneva; 1984 Geneva twice; 1989 Algiers; 1993 Nice; 1994 Algiers; 1999 Paris.

Current fleet

Boeing 747 41
Airbus A340 22
Boeing 777 25
Airbus A330 8
Boeing 767 5
Airbus A310 2
Airbus A320 series 119 (a mix of A319, A320 & A321 types)
Boeing 737 36

On order:

Airbus A380 10
Boeing 747 2
Boeing 777 13
Airbus A330 10
Airbus A320 20 (Includes A318, A319 & A321.)

(As of 2002.)

Air France plans to merge with KLM.