zrs70 From United States of America, joined Dec 2000, 2872 posts, RR: 10 Posted (11 months 2 weeks 21 hours ago) and read 2692 times:
Most major carriers have names that obviously connect them to their country/region. What are the ones that don't? (I'll include acronyms, as their means usually aren't obvious). Let's look at both current and defunct carriers.
Lufthansa
El Al
MALEV
Aer Lingus ( unless Lingus is a place!)
Aeroflot
Braniff
People Express
Sabena
Qantas
cedarjet From United Kingdom, joined May 1999, 7703 posts, RR: 55 Reply 1, posted (11 months 2 weeks 20 hours ago) and read 2684 times:
Olympic Airways. Now only a domestic carrier but for decades was a prestigious national flag carrier flying 747s to five continents (if that sounds unlikely given the state of Greece and it's airlines in 2012, let me remind you: Europe of course; North America - NY, Toronto; Asia - Bangkok, Singapore, Tokyo; Australia - Mel, Syd; Africa - Nairobi, Jo'burg).
MEA Middle East Airlines. Obviously refers by name to the general region but it is the flag carrier for Lebanon, a single country (as opposed to the old Gulf Air or Air Afrique that is named after the region but this made sense cos they actually had bases in more than one country).
Ansett.
Alia. The old name for Royal Jordanian. "Alia" is a popular girls name in Arabic, and King Hussein named his national airline after his daughter. Name changed to Royal Jordanian Airlines in the late 80s.
Continental Airlines.
National Airlines.
(Technically QANTAS and Lufthansa refer to their origin - QANTAS is of course an acronym and stands for Queensland And Northern Territory Air Service; and Hansa was a medieval German empire, so perhaps it's like BA being Albion Airways or Turkish Airlines being Air Byzantine.)
fly Saha Air 707s daily from Tehran's downtown Mehrabad to Mashhad, Kish Island and Ahwaz
Yflyer From United States of America, joined Feb 2007, 838 posts, RR: 1 Reply 2, posted (11 months 2 weeks 20 hours ago) and read 2678 times:
Ones I can think of in the US off the top of my head:
Allegient
Spirit
AirTran
Frontier (I guess you could argue that "the frontier" is a place, but it's not refering to any specific geographic location)
United (Unless "United" refers to the United States, but I don't think it does)
Continental (I kind of debated about that one, but since it doesn't refer to any specific continent I decided it counts)
srbmod From United States of America, joined Mar 2001, 16888 posts, RR: 51 Reply 4, posted (11 months 2 weeks 19 hours ago) and read 2645 times:
Quoting Yflyer (Reply 2): Frontier (I guess you could argue that "the frontier" is a place, but it's not refering to any specific geographic location)
For most Americans, you say Frontier and the western US typically comes to mind, which happens to be the region of the US both incarnations of Frontier are from.
Quoting Yflyer (Reply 2): United (Unless "United" refers to the United States, but I don't think it does)
The United name is from when it was known as United Air Lines and was owned by United Aircraft & Transportation, which was a company that "united" business interests in all areas of aviation (engine manufacturers, aircraft manufacturers, airlines). United Aircraft & Transportation was broken up as the result of the Air Mail Act of 1934, which also resulted in United Air Lines being renamed United Airlines as well as a number of airlines due to their "predecessor" airlines being banned from flying and the airlines simply renamed themselves slightly (For example Northwest Airways became Northwest Airlines, American Airways became American Airlines.).
1337Delta764 From United States of America, joined Oct 2005, 5759 posts, RR: 2 Reply 5, posted (11 months 2 weeks 19 hours ago) and read 2629 times:
BTW, very few know this, but the origin of the Delta name for Delta Air Lines refers to the Mississippi River Delta, since Delta's former headquarters was in Monroe, Louisiana, which is on the Mississippi River Delta.
The Pink Delta 767-400ER - The most beautiful aircraft in the sky
planejamie From United Kingdom, joined Sep 2011, 572 posts, RR: 0 Reply 6, posted (11 months 2 weeks 19 hours ago) and read 2621 times:
West Jet
Jetblue
easyJet
Ryanair (I think)
AF Cityjet
KLM Cityflyer
flybe (the BE part used to be 'British European, but I think it's lost all meaning now there's a flybe nordic)
Have to challenge that one- Westjet definitely refers to the geographic "West" in Canada. Founded in Calgary, the early plan had it serving the West (generally referring to everything west of the Ontario-Manitoba border). It has since expanded of course.
Other Canadian examples of smaller but notable air services::
Porter Airlines
First Air
Jazz
Arguable
SkyService (Is the Sky a geographic location?)
SunWings (Refers to winter vacation spots, so might be a geographic reference similar to SouthWest, etc.,etc.)
Harbour Air (I don't know if this refers to '1' Harbour specifically, or if it means any harbour!
BE77 From Canada, joined Nov 2007, 455 posts, RR: 0 Reply 10, posted (11 months 2 weeks 17 hours ago) and read 2551 times:
Hmmm, this far into the thread, and we are having trouble deciding if Virgin is a geographic location or destination?
I suppose it could be consdiered a place to go...or a place to get away from.
Viscount724 From Switzerland, joined Oct 2006, 21481 posts, RR: 24 Reply 11, posted (11 months 2 weeks 16 hours ago) and read 2522 times:
Former Canadian carrier Wardair (acquired by Canadian Airlines in 1989), named for its bush pilot founder and CEO for its entire history, Max Ward (now 90 and still living in YEG where he was born).
The OP included region, which I would certainly say applies. Just because the airline chose an ambitious name attempting to cover the entire broader region doesn't make it any less geographic.
LOT is actually named "Polskie Linie Lotnicze LOT" in Polish, and does business as "LOT Polish Airlines" in English. In both cases, it definitely refers to Poland. Avianca is an acronym in Spanish for "AerovÃas Nacionales de Colombia," so it also references its country.
Queensland And Northern Territory Air Service (or so). How is that not a geographical name?
Cheers
Coal
Because there is no airline today named Queensland And Northern Territory Aerial Service and has not been since the 1930s. The name is "Qantas" which really has no geographical referents and doesn't even stand for Q.A.N.T.A.S any more. How many people think of Queensland & the Northern Territory when they hear "Qantas"? Not many, even in Australia.
Bluebird191 From Australia, joined Apr 2011, 76 posts, RR: 0 Reply 18, posted (11 months 2 weeks 12 hours ago) and read 2433 times:
I'm one for arguing that Qantas does include geography - when QF was founded back in the 1920's, it was an acronym for Queensland And Northern Territory Aerial Service. They may not promote their acronym (or should we say former acronym) but thats what it did signify back in the day. Now that Qantad almost considers Sydney and Melbourne as almost the sole international airports in Australia, the acronym sadly no longer carries any meaning or significance.
steex From United States of America, joined Jun 2007, 1425 posts, RR: 9 Reply 20, posted (11 months 2 weeks 11 hours ago) and read 2419 times:
Quoting RyanairGuru (Reply 17):
The only other airline I can come up with with such a name is the re-branding of AR as simply "Aerolineas"
Aeroflot would be pretty close, with a literal translation of "Air Fleet" in English.
Looking again through some of the lists above, I noticed a few more that people have named but are indeed geographically named:
Malev Hungarian - this one is a little bit of a grey area since Malev Ltd. was the name of the company, but they always did business as Malev Hungarian Airlines.
TAROM - TAROM is an acronym for "Transporturile Aeriene Române" in the full name S.C. Compania Națională de Transporturi Aeriene Române TAROM S.A. However, even with the acronym, the company does business as TAROM Romanian Air Transport.
Same for Avianca. It used to be Aerovias Nacionales de Colombia (previously known as Scadta, Sociedad Colombo-Alemana de Transporte Aereo). Now, Avianca stands for something like Aerovias del Continente Americano, which makes sense given their merger with TA.
Cheers Coal
Nxt Flts: QR SIN-DPS | SQ DPS-SIN | 3K SIN-SGN-SIN | SQ SIN-PEK | CA PEK-FNJ-PEK | CX PEK-HKG-CGK
Truemanqld From Australia, joined Feb 2007, 1335 posts, RR: 0 Reply 24, posted (11 months 2 weeks 4 hours ago) and read 2354 times:
I find it funny that QF doesn't even mention Australia in the name, but would (arguably) be the most recognised airline in the world, just by its tail...
25 HOONS90: Spring Airlines SpiceJet Airblue Jin Air Peach Aviation Uni Air Transavia Windjet Vueling Colgan Air Pinnacle Airlines Republic Airlines Compass Airli
26 eurowings: Close, but "Lingus" isn't actually an Irish Gaelic word, it's an Anglicisation of "Loingeas", which means 'fleet' or 'shipping'. In this context it's
27 steex: I think most people knew what TWA stood for, but I reckon you could probably still include it since "world" lacks any specificity at all in a geograp
29 HOONS90: Spring Airlines: 28 aircraft + 5 on order SpiceJet: 40 aircraft + 29 on order Transavia: 32 aircraft Vueling: 55 aircraft Colgan Air: 62 aircraft Pin
30 zrs70: My bad! I should remove People Express, then, as well! There are tons on small, mickey mouse airlines, that have more generic names, which is why I w
32 srbmod: The original name for TWA was Transcontinental & Western Air (It was created from the merger of Transcontinental Air Transport and Western Air Ex
Sponsor Message: 
From United States of America, joined Dec 2000, 2872 posts, 
From United Kingdom, joined May 1999, 7703 posts, 
From Belgium, joined Aug 2003, 1519 posts, 
From Germany, joined Jan 2006, 8357 posts, 
From Canada, joined Nov 2007, 455 posts, 
From Switzerland, joined Oct 2006, 21481 posts, 
From Australia, joined Nov 2003, 5217 posts, 
From Singapore, joined Dec 2008, 1011 posts, 
Printer friendly format 
