Fly Iraqi Airways?

Borzou Daragahi wrote an interesting article for the New York Times earlier this month on this one-plane airline.

Yes, that's correct: Iraqi Airlines consists of one plane, a Boeing 737-200 flying to the capitals of Syria and Jordan.

The plane's crew is pictured below.

This is no ordinary airline; the rest of its fleet was destroyed in the war and its aftermath.

60% of the price of a ticket goes to cover insurance costs.

To stay out of the range of fire from insurgent surface-to-air missiles, pilots must make steep corkscrew descents within a 30-square-kilometer area around the airport sealed off by U.S. troops.

The way I see it, there's nothing but upside - as long as their sole remaining plane can dodge those incomings.

Here's the Times story.
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Iraqi Airways Flies Again, With One Jet

Nearly dormant during 14 years of sanctions and still reeling from the damage it has suffered in the U.S.-led war, Iraq's national airline resumed service last month with a 116-seat Boeing 737-200 flying to the capitals of Syria and Jordan.

The airline, Iraqi Airways, has even begun making plans to expand its fleet, add destinations, renovate its headquarters and generally upgrade for a new age of commercial aviation.

"We are looking at this as a business," said Atta Nabeil, Iraq's interim deputy minister of transportation, who oversees the government-owned airline.

"We would like to operate just like any normal private operator. We would like to make a profit."

But Iraq is still a dangerous country where insurgents regularly fire rockets at airplanes.

Last year, in the biggest such scare so far, a DHL Worldwide Express cargo plane landed with its wing on fire from a rocket attack.

To stay out of range of fire, pilots must make steep corkscrew descents within a 30-square-kilometer, or 12-square-mile, secured area around Baghdad airport.

And though there are civilians willing to brave the Iraqi skies, there is no guarantee that Iraqi Airways, whose planes thus far have flown nearly empty, will snare much business.

"Iraqi Airways has got a lot of catching up to do," Michael Repking, senior vice president of Global Aviation, an aviation consultancy based in Jidda, Saudi Arabia, said in a phone interview from the company's Dubai office.

"First they must refurbish their fleet, then their airport, and then all the airports in the country."

The industry the airline has re-entered is under far greater commercial pressure than 14 years ago.

And the region is now dominated by sleek Gulf carriers like Emirates Airlines of Dubai and Qatar Airways, based in places where airports have invested in multibillion-dollar expansions.

Some foreign competitors have a head start in Iraqi Airways' own backyard.

Royal Jordanian has been flying daily, half-full flights from the Jordanian capital, Amman, and Mahan Airlines, a privately held Iranian airline, is about to begin flights to Iraq, said Emad Dawood, Iraq's director general of civil aviation.

The freight giants DHL, a unit of Deutsche Post, and FedEx, as well as Air Serv International, a nonprofit carrier that catering to aid workers, have also been flying regularly to Baghdad.

According to Dawood, an additional 100 or so international passenger and cargo carriers have submitted applications to land at Baghdad International Airport, which is 21 years old and has just 18 gates.

Iraqi Airways, founded in 1946, grew to 23 planes and flew to dozens of international destinations before Iraq's escalating troubles caught up with it.

Just before the 1991 war over Kuwait, the airline flew most of its fleet to Iran, Jordan and Tunisia, where the planes avoided the war but deteriorated during the years of sanctions.

Back home, what was left of the fleet stayed on the ground until 2001, when the airline briefly restarted limited flights before the war last year stopped it again completely.

The war and its aftermath were cruel to the airline.

Its multistory headquarters were looted and damaged.

One airport terminal was hit by a U.S. missile, and many landing strips were destroyed by bombing.

Two working planes were vandalized.

But reconstruction of the runways and terminals has been moving apace despite power outages, a dearth of phone lines and an abundance of artillery fire.

While architects draw up plans to rebuild the damaged former headquarters, Iraqi Airways officers remain in their former information technology building, with its discoloring acoustic tile ceilings and worn floors.

The airline expects to sign a lease deal on another Boeing or two in the coming months.

Officials also say they think at least two 727s from the old fleet can be salvaged.

Planned destinations include Dubai, the Middle East's commercial hub, and Tehran, to cater to Iranian pilgrims who want to visit Iraqi holy sites.

Flights to Basra may start again next month.

And airline officials point to long-dormant plans to build an airport in Najaf as another potential moneymaker.

To drum up business, the airline has begun a local media advertising campaign.

Tickets are sold through Iraqi Airways offices in Iraq and a network of some 50 foreign sales agents.

Round-trip flights to Amman cost $750, significantly less than the $1,100 Royal Jordanian charges for the 90-minute flights, but more than the $40 ordinary Iraqis pay for a 16-hour bus ride through sandstorms, bandits and the insurgency.

Driving anywhere near the airport, located on the U.S. military's Camp Victory, where Saddam Hussein is imprisoned, requires a special badge.

To get to the drop-off point, passengers must wait up to two hours in line, undergoing repeated searches by Iraqi security forces and Nepalese contractors who often speak neither Arabic nor English.

Flights are often canceled because of security worries.

Insurance costs make up as much as 60% of the airline's ticket costs.

"The insurance company still considers some of our airspace as a war zone," said Nabeil, the interim deputy minister of transportation.