Aurigny Air Services

Early years

Aurigny Air Services was founded by Sir Derrick Bailey and started operations on March 1, 1968, after British United Airways withdrew from the Alderney to Guernsey route. It initially operated Britten-Norman Islander aircraft, developing a highly efficient network linking the Channel Islands with each other and with France and the United Kingdom. During the first year of operations, the airline carried 45,000 passengers between Guernsey, Jersey, and Alderney.

Aurigny became the first commercial operator of the Britten-Norman Trislander in July 1971; the airline remained the world's largest operator of the type until its retirement. The use of this larger aircraft enabled the route network to be expanded to include the south coast of England and northern France. In 1977, Aurigny banned smoking on all services, the first ever airline to do so. In 1979, it acquired Anglo Normandy Aviation, which was established in 1975. In 1993, Aurigny won a contract to carry mail between the Channel Islands and the UK, and in 1999 it began daily services from Guernsey to London Stansted Airport and Amsterdam Schiphol, operated by Saab 340 aircraft. The latter route was later dropped due to poor demand, but its introduction marked the airline's transition from a local carrier to a regional airline.

Regional transition

Ownership of the airline passed from Aurigny Aviation Holdings to Close Brothers Private Equity on 23 May 2000. On 15 May 2003, it was wholly acquired by the States of Guernsey. The acquisition came following an announcement that British Airways was to cease operating their route between London Gatwick and Guernsey, just two months before Guernsey was slated to host the 2003 Island Games.

On 21 June 2007, Aurigny got permission from its sole shareholder, the States of Guernsey, to raise a private loan to purchase two new ATR 72-500 aircraft, which entered service in March 2009.

In March 2009, the airline announced that it was to operate a route between Guernesy and London Stansted Airport, and that it would begin a service from Guernsey to East Midlands Airport. Daily flights to those destinations commenced from 1 May 2009, and the airline additionally increased the frequency of flights between Guernsey and London Gatwick from four to five daily return flights. In August 2009, Aurigny announced that it would be operating winter flights to Grenoble using its ATR 72-500 aircraft. The flights ran from 26 December 2009 to midway through February 2010. The route was repeated for the 2010/2011 winter season, but flights continued until March. This extension did not prove viable, and the route halted in mid-February from the 2011/2012 season onwards. Aurigny noted that they sold more tickets to Grenoble in the 2011/2012 season, despite the reduced service.

Recent history

In July 2010, it was announced that Blue Islands was planning to buy Aurigny, and was undergoing a due diligence process with the Treasury and Resources department of the States of Guernsey. This sparked major debate throughout the islands, and a Facebook page in opposition to the proposed buy-out gained 530 members. On 14 September, Treasury and Resources announced that the sale would not go ahead.

Blue Islands' withdrawal from Alderney on 9 May 2011 left Aurigny with a monopoly on services to that island for the first time in over a decade. However, it was criticised later that year for cutting the number of flights between Alderney and Southampton, not lowering prices and reducing services to twice daily over that winter; managing director Malcolm Hart later reaffirmed the airline's commitment to the route and admitted that encouraging passengers to fly via Guernsey had been 'the biggest mistake in Aurigny's recent history'. At the end of 2011, in cooperation with Eurocontrol, Aurigny rolled out the first GPS approach system in Europe, for use by its Trislanders at Alderney and Southampton airports. The system, based on the European Geostationary Navigation Overlay Service, allowed flights to operate in lower visibility and in poorer weather than before.

In October 2013, Mark Darby joined the company as CEO after six months as a non-executive director. Under his leadership, Aurigny initiated an eight-week trial for the Dornier 228 as a replacement for the Trislander fleet, leasing the aircraft from Sevenair . It later purchased one of the 228 variant of the aircraft and two of the 228NG variant. The aircraft arrived through 2014 and 2015.

After Flybe announced that it would withdraw from the London Gatwick – Guernsey route by March 2014, Aurigny became the sole operator on that route, and ordered an Embraer 195 to meet the increased demand. The aircraft was delivered on 24 June 2014, and a similar aircraft was wet leased from Flybe between March and June to provide capacity in the interim. Given substantial government investment in fleet acquisition, and its monopoly position on the Gatwick route, Aurigny struck an agreement with the States of Guernesy in April 2014, committing to offer 65% of fares for £65.00 or less.