( based in
Amman ,
Jordan . It operates scheduled international services over four continents. Its main base is
Queen Alia International Airport (AMM), Amman.
Royal Jordanian is a member of the
Arab Air Carriers Organization and will join the
world alliance at the turn of
2006 and
2007 .
The airline was established on
9 December 1963 and started operations on
15 December 1963 after a royal decree by His Majesty the late
King Hussein . The airline was named Alia to honor the King's late wife. It was founded with capital from private shareholders who were later bought out by the Jordanian government to provide substantial funding to expand operations. Alia Jordanian Airlines started with only a handful of airplanes and three international routes, to
Kuwait City ,
Beirut and
Cairo . Two
Handley Page Dart Heralds and a
Douglas DC-7 were used.
1964 saw another DC-7 arrive and services to
Jeddah inaugurated. In
1965 , Alia touched down in
Europe for the first time, with
Rome added to the route system. All the progress the airline made was threatened by the Israeli air raid during the
1967 war when the DC-7's were destroyed. These planes were replaced by two
Fokker F27 planes.
1968 saw expansion to
Nicosia ,
Benghazi ,
Dhahran and
Doha .
1969 saw further expansion into Europe and other parts of
Asia , including
Munich ,
Tehran and
Istanbul .
The ,
Dubai ,
Muscat ,
Rabat ,
Geneva ,
Amsterdam ,
Baghdad ,
Bangkok ,
Vienna ,
Larnaca ,
Damascus ,
New York City ,
Ras Al-Khaimah and
Houston . In
1979 , Alia became a founding member of the Arab Airlines Technical Consortium (AATC).
The
1980s were a time that would reshape the airline.
Tunis and
Tripoli joined the route map, and Alia's
IBM computer center was inaugurated.
Lockheed L-1011 s and
Airbus A310 s and
A320 s joined the fleet and in
1986 , Alia changed its name to Royal Jordanian. The airline's first woman pilot flew one of their aircraft for the first time during this decade, and services were added to other cities, including
Belgrade ,
Chicago ,
Bucharest ,
Los Angeles ,
Singapore ,
Riyadh ,
Kuala Lumpur (in cooperation with
Malaysian Airlines ),
Sana'a ,
Moscow ,
Miami ,
Montreal ,
New Delhi Calcutta and
Ankara . This decade also saw the opening of the Gabriel Automated Ticket System, (GATS).
The
1990s saw the expansion continue. Royal Jordanian and nine other Arabian airlines signed up with the Galileo reservations system, the IMCS maintenance and engineering system was added, a new city terminal was opened in Amman, services to
Gaza were inaugurated, making Royal Jordanian the first airline to fly to the new
Gaza International Airport , Royal Jordanian will restart flights to Tehran and Tripoli and the cities of
Toronto ,
Colombo ,
Jakarta ,
Berlin ,
Mumbai and
Milan were added to the route network. Royal Jordanian became code sharing partners with
TWA . Since October
1998 the airline has been undergoing a restructuring and privatisation programme.
In
2000 the
FAA renewed the airlines maintenance and engineering department's license, and the duty free shop was among the services to be privatised. A holding company, RJI, wholly owned by the government, was incorporated as a public limited company in February
2001 to hold all the airline and associated investments. The name has been officially changed to Alia, The Royal Jordanian Airline, although to its clients it is still known simply as Royal Jordanian.
Subsidiary
Royal Wings started Royal Jordanian's first domestic service to
Aqaba using a
Fokker F-27 plane on
10 February 1996 . Royal Wings now operates
Bombardier Dash 8 Q300 aircraft on both scheduled and charter services to destinations in
Egypt ,
Cyprus ,
Israel and
Palestine . Royal Jordanian signed an agreement in
October 2005 for two
Q400 s previously operated by
SAS Commuter , larger and faster variants of the Dash 8 series.
On
October 17 2005 , the airline accepted its invitation to join
Oneworld Alliance , becoming the first
Middle East airline to join a worldwide alliance.
''See full article:'' .
The Royal Jordanian fleet consists of the following aircraft (at June 2005):
On
March 22 ,
2006 Embraer and Royal Jordanian have signed a contract for the acquisition of seven firm
EMBRAER 195 s, with deliveries due to start in the fourth quarter of
2006 .
