Germanwings is a German low-cost carrier, founded in 2002 by Eurowings Luftverkehrs-AG. The headquarters are in Dortmund, but the main base is Cologne-Bonn airport. Lufthansa owns 49 % of Germanwings and is controlling the airline due to cooperation with other stakeholders.
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Germanwings is a German low-cost carrier, founded in 2002 by Eurowings Luftverkehrs-AG. The headquarters are in Dortmund, but the main base is Cologne-Bonn airport. Lufthansa owns 49 % of Germanwings and is controlling the airline due to cooperation with other stakeholders.
The first flight was operated on October 27, 2002. Today the airline has a route network of 9 inner-German and 58 European destinations. It uses four hubs, Cologne-Bonn, Stuttgart, Berlin-Schönefeld and Hamburg. Its main competitors are EasyJet, Ryanair and TUIfly.com.
Germanwings claims to be the first low-cost airline introducing a frequent flyer program. It is called “Boomerang Club” and offers a free flight for 8 return or 16 one-way flights.
In February 2007 Germanwings owned a fleet of 21 Airbus A319 and 3 A320. Six of the A319 use a special Germanwings configuration offering 156 instead of 144 seats. The average fleet age was 6.9 years in 2006.
The airline introduced some special liveries, among them the “Berlin Bearbus” (D-AKNO) advertising Berlin-Schönefeld airport.
On February 13, 2007, a plane exploded at Wnukowo airport in Moscow. First news reported a Germanwings A319 to be the crashed aircraft. This was disclaimed later. It would have been the first major crash of a European low-cost carrier.
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