At its height, World Airways was one of the largest and most successful airlines of its time. However, in March 2014, 66 years almost to the day, the airline was forced to cease operations. So what went so wrong?
Over the course of its history, World Airways has performed just about every type of aviation-related job, possible. In part, this has helped to make it so successful, but it was also partly the reason why it failed!
Pre-World Airways
WWII was the largest war in human history. No conflict before or since it has managed to match the size and scope of the conflict.
Due to the sheer size of the war, everyone, both young and old were asked to help with the war effort. Part of this meant that young men had to be transported from the US, to Europe in order to help fight the Axis.
At the time, the US Army Air Corps and US Navy simply didn’t have enough aircraft to transport all of their soldiers to Europe. As such, all airliners were taken by the USAAC for the duration of the war.
This led to the USAAC and USN having an abundance of aircraft, but no one to fly them. As such, young men were recruited as pilots, and were taught how to fly these multi-engine airliners. Among these people was Benjamin Pepper.
Pepper joined the US Navy shortly after the attacks on Pearl Harbor. During the war, Pepper flew Boeing 314 Clipper flying boats, which had been requisitioned from Pan Am.
Following the war, Pepper continued to fly the Clipper, albeit for Pan Am, once they’d been returned following the end of the war. However, within only a few years of them getting the Clipper back, Pan Am was looking at retiring them.
Formation
Pepper, on the other hand, believed that he could continue using the Clippers he so loved. He believed that he could perform the long distance airmail-passenger combi flights and still make a profit.
As such, in 1948, he quit his job and negotiated with Pan Am for their three Clippers. Eventually, Pan Am boss Juan Trippe greenlight the deal, and Pepper founded World Airways, Inc. on March 29 1948.
Initially, Pepper followed his original business plan of flying airmail and passengers. This proved to be quite lucrative initially. However, by early 1950, business had dropped off severely, as people didn’t want to fly on the relatively old Clipper.
Luckily for Pepper, the local Beroviche Steamship Company was looking to expand into the aviation industry, and approached Pepper to buy it, which they did later that year. Here, they poured thousands of dollars into the airline.
This money helped to financially stabilize the airline. Thanks to this money, the airline was able to retire the Clippers in favor of newer Curtiss C-46 Commandos. However, the airline continued to be unprofitable for Beroviche.
In 1950, a then-26 year old Ed Daly, already a seasoned entrepreneur from the age of 15, purchased the airline for $50,000. From here, he would acquire several Douglas DC-4 airliners to expand the airline’s service.
Vietnam War
In 1951, the airline received its first government contract for cargo transportation. For the next six decades, the airline would be used as the US government’s go-to cargo contractor.
During the 1950’s, the airline expanded its fleet to using the much larger Douglas DC-6s and Lockheed Constellations. In the 1960’s, World entered the jet era, acquiring new Boeing 707s and 727s to replace their older turboprops.
The 1960’s also saw the war in Vietnam expand, gaining worldwide attention. With this increased attention, President John F. Kennedy announced that US military operations would expand to fight the Viet Cong.
To do this, the US military needed to bring more troops and equipment into Vietnam than it could on its own. As such, they turned to the private sector, with World Airways becoming one of their key contractors.
From 1963, until the war’s end in 1975, World Airways would fly millions of tons of materials and equipment into the country, as well as thousands of men.
Ed Daly, still World’s owner and CEO, was invited to take part in the last airlift out of Da Nang in 1975. Here, Daly would help to save the lives of almost 330 people, whilst on national television.
Post-Vietnam Expansion
For the US military, Vietnam was a complete an total disaster. For World, it was the beginning of something greater. The World Airway’s brand had been engrained in the minds of the American public over the course of 1960’s and 1970’s.
In order to keep its military contracts during Vietnam, the airline was forced to suspend all of its passenger flights, and covert their passenger aircraft into cargo or combi aircraft.
Whilst World had been helping the war effort, the commercial aviation industry had changed drastically. Then, in 1978, Congress passed the Airline Deregulation Act, creating a myriad of new airlines.
Seeing this, and not wanting to compete with these new airlines, and sticking to what it knew, World decided to remain as a cargo airline. Over the course of the late 1970’s, it would be contracted by several major cargo companies.
Due to this, the airline expanded its fleet of jet aircraft to include several 747-200s configured as cargo aircraft. In the early 1980’s, the airline would also receive several Douglas DC-10 trijets.
The injection of newer aircraft allowed many of the airline’s remaining Boeing 707s and 727s to be retired.
By the late 1980’s, the airline had grown so much, that it bought Key Airlines from Presidential Airways (then-owned by Mitt Romney’s Bain Capital!)
Transition to Charter
In the early 1980’s, Ed Daly decided that he wanted the airline to expand into other areas than just cargo. Despite his earlier reservations, Daly chose to make the airline a half-cargo airline and a half-passenger airline.
As such, the airline began regularly scheduled passenger operations in 1980. As Daly had earlier feared, the commercial aviation industry proved to be too competitive, and World Airways suffered financially as a result.
This was so bad that Ed Daly had to form the WorldCorp parent company in order to own World Airways and keep it in business. Due to the tremendous financial suffering of the airline, WorldCorp began looking for other sources of revenue.
Here, they encountered the concept of charter airlines. Essentially, charter airlines were cargo airlines for the vast majority of the year. However, during peak periods, the airline would run high volume passenger flights.
To WorldCorp, this was the best of both worlds. It kept them doing what they were so good at, and kept them financially liquid during low periods, which had previously brought them to the brink of bankruptcy.
Starting in the mid-1980’s, World Airways would operate charter flights to and from major US cities. Over time, the airline would also expand to offering international flights to London and Frankfurt too!
The Problem
In the 1990’s, the airline expanded once again, gaining lucrative military contracts with the onset of the First Gulf War. During the 1990’s and 2000’s, much of the airline’s income was generated from military contracts.
At the same time, the airline began wet leasing many of its aircraft. This continued to bring in millions of dollars for the airline alongside its charter operations and military contracts.
However, by the early-to-mid 2000’s, the airline had begun to rely almost solely on wet leasing and military contracts. For the most part, the airline had essentially become a subsidiary of another airline and the US military.
Despite the airline bringing in record amounts in terms of profits, the airline wasn’t using its resources the most effectively. In 2005 alone, the airline flew thousands of one-leg flights without any cargo, thus, losing money.
This was brought to the attention of WorldCorp several times throughout the 2000’s. However, they always dismissed it, pointing to the airline’s record profits and the long line of lucrative military contracts waiting for the airline.
In the end, this got too big, and WorldCorp was forced to sell the airline to a newly formed holdings company, World Air Holdings, in 2006. Here, they pledged to fix the airline’s mismanagement of resources.
Sale and Ceasing Operations
For the next two years, World Air Holdings would work tirelessly to try to streamline the company’s resources. However, due to the erratic nature of the company, they struggled to streamline the company at all.
In the end, World Air Holdings was forced to sell World Airways. After searching for a buyer, ATA Holdings (the parent company of ATA Airlines and North American Airlines) proved to be the only serious bidder.
After months of negotiations, ATA Holdings and World Airways announced in March 2008, that World Airways would be bought out by ATA Holdings for $315 million.
Here, the airline’s few remaining military contracts were cancelled by the US government. On top of this, ATA Holdings would be renamed Global Aero Logistics to reflect their acquisition of World Airways.
Through the cancellation of the airline’s remaining military contracts, Global Aero Logistics hoped that they’d be able to effectively manage the airline’s resources. This is something they managed during the then-ongoing Great Recession.
During the Great Recession, cargo airlines like World Airways had flourished. However, once the market had stabilized, the airline once again, began to mismanage its resources.
As such, on March 27 2014, almost 66 years to the day, the airline ceased all operations and entered liquidation. Here, their aircraft went into storage (one was scrapped due to its age) and all staff were made redundant.
This latter part was also partly due to Global Aero Logistics’ own bankruptcy in 2014 as well.
Revival
In November 2017, the airline’s liquidator placed all of the airline’s intellectual property up for sale. Here, it was purchased by Miami-based investment firm 777 Partners.
The following day, 777 Partners announced that they’d be using the legacy of World Airways and their newly acquired intellectual property, they’d be relaunching the airline.
However, they announced that the new airline would not follow in the footsteps of its predecessor. Instead, the airline would be relaunched as a low cost long range airline, intending to use 787 Dreamliners.
As of the time of writing, the airline has not begun operations. The airline has not purchased any aircraft , nor has it officially announced any flights. The only official thing is the airline’s main hubs, in the form of MAI and LAX.
What Was it Like to Fly on World Airways?
Personally, I was fortunate enough to fly on the airline on multiple occasions, both for business and for pleasure. I have also been able to interview several people who’d also flown on the airline over its history as well.
For me, until I started researching this airline, I always thought it was a now-defunct, passenger airline. The staff were just as courteous as any other airline, with them handling everything in a professional manner.
Despite the seats spending much of their time sat in a warehouse, I actually found that they were comfier and had a comparatively larger pitch than most other airlines (both charter and not) would!
I also managed to speak with several people who’d flown on the airline, even before I was born. In particular, I managed to interview a Vietnam War veteran, who’d flown on the airline several times during his tour. He had this to say:
During my service in the military, I flew on several aircraft, military and civil alike. On the outside, World Airways didn’t seem like much, they just seemed like any other private contractor during the war.
However, on the inside, the airline was much comfier than I’d imagined. Compared to the other military contractors, the flight was much smoother, the seats were comfier and the flight attendants were much kinder and more courteous than other contractors were.
Although, this wasn’t the reason why they stood out in my mind. The reason why they stood out, was because they were fast. Compared to their competitors on the same routes, they beat them in terms of speed. Every time.
How Safe Was World Airways?
Sadly, unless you have access to a time machine, you’ll never be able to fly on the original incarnation of the airline. And even then, most of the airline’s later flights were chartered cargo flight, not passenger ones.
Regardless, it is still important to understand how safe or dangerous the airline was as a whole.
Both today, and at the time, World Airways was considered to be quite a safe airline to travel on. In its almost 66 years history, the airline only ever had five aviation-related incidents.
Of these five incidents, there were 89 fatalities, with 80 of those coming from a single accident in September 1960. Almost all of these incidents resulted in injuries, the vast majority of these were not serious.
For the most part, these incidents were pilot and/or human error. Occasionally, World captains chose not to follow flight plans or ATC instructions, which led to these crashes.
Occasionally, it was also the fault of the maintenance crews, be it for the aircraft or the airport the aircraft was landing on.
In terms of the aircraft that the airline operated, they were among the safest aircraft of their time. Aircraft like the 747-400 and MD-11 are still some of the safest aircraft to this day.
However, many of their earlier aircraft, such as the DC-4 and DC-6 were among the most dangerous aircraft in history. This was true back then, just as it is now.
Legacy
Due partly to its fame, as well as its immense success, World Airways has left a rather large impact on the aviation industry as a whole!
Pop Culture
Between 1955 and 2010, almost every film that involved an airport or an aircraft, often had at least one World Airways aircraft in the background. Sometimes, these aircraft are parked, whilst other times, they are arriving or departing.
Due to the airline being a non-scheduled cargo airline, it was perfect for many movie studios to use. Digital renderings of the airline have been used in multiple tv shows and Hollywood blockbusters, with the permission of the airline.
Since the airline’s demise in 2014, the airline has continued to be used in pop culture. Where they were merely mentioned in passing before, the airline is mentioned directly, often as a fictional airline (bearing the exact same livery as before!)
Airline Industry
Whilst World may not have been the first airline to do perform regularly scheduled cargo and chartered passenger flights at the same time, it did help to popularize the idea throughout the early charter airline industry.
Partly related to this, World also helped many legacy carriers to realize the benefits of diversifying their business beyond just passenger flights. Over the course of the 1970’s, this is what many legacy carriers did.
On top of their passenger flights, they also began running cargo arms, often using their large, retired jet airliners. A few, such as British Airways, even began charter operations too (such as with the Concorde!)
What did you think of World Airways? Did you ever fly on them? Tell me in the comments!
Featured image courtesy of Cory W. Watts via Flickr.