Canada 3000

Canada 3000 was a discount Canadian, charter airline headquartered in Toronto, Ontario offering domestic and international flights. It was the largest charter airline in the world at the time of its operation, with over 90 destinations worldwide, although it changed to scheduled service in 2000 after the Canadian Airlines and Air Canada merge. Canada 3000 competed with Air Canada, Westjet, and fellow charter airline Air Transat. In November of 2001, the airline went out of business after a sharp decline in revenues following the September 11th 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States. There have been several attempts to restart the airline since then.

History

Created in 1988 by British airline Air 2000, initially for charter service, it underwent a corporate reorganization and change in ownership during the 1990s when it merged with charter carrier Royal Aviation or Royal Airlines of Montreal, Quebec. It also took over CanJet Airlines (since then CanJet has resurfaced). Following the merger of Canadian Airlines International with Air Canada, Canada 3000 positioned itself as a scheduled discount carrier for the domestic market, in addition to its ongoing charter service, and underwent a rapid expansion, garnering up to 30% of Canadian passenger traffic at its peak, flying to the United States, Europe, and Australia. Shortly (one month) before its demise, Canada 3000 became the first airline to operate non-stop service from North America to India .

This included introducing a new "Club C3" Class in some aircraft.

The rest of the fleet was left grounded at various airports around the world, as the airline couldn't pay the airport fees

The company also acquired the Royal Airlines' cargo operation, renaming it Canada 3000 Cargo. The Cargo operation was sold off and became Cargojet Airways that is still in operation.

On November 8th 2001 the company suddenly collapsed with no warning for travellers or employees. The company filed for bankruptcy, citing a downturn in air travel during the weeks following the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the United States.

In 2002, the former owner of Royal Airlines and director with Canada 3000 Michel Leblanc went on to form another scheduled discount airline, Jetsgo, which lasted almost three years before it too collapsed and filed for backruptcy protection on March 11, 2005.

Latest Updates

A group of investors plans to launch a new Canada 3000 with two Boeing 757-200 aircraft (ref: Flight International, April 2005).

Robert Deluce, the brother of Canada's 7 year CEO Peter Deluce, has begun the setup of a new airline in Toronto, Porter Airlines, the airline should start flying late 2006 from the Toronto City Centre Airport.

Fleet

Aircraft used by Canada 3000 included:

Code data

IATA Code: 2T
ICAO Code: CMM
Callsign Code: Elite

External links