SIR FREDDIE LAKER is to re-enter the transatlantic airline business in a venture backed by Texas oil millionaire Oscar Wyatt.
The UK businessman plans to launch Laker Airways on routes from Florida to the UK before the end of this year.
Laker has yet to seek regulatory approval from the US Department of Transportation, but has announced a provisional plan initially to connect Orlando and Fort Lauderdale in Florida with London Gatwick, Manchester and Glasgow. Reports in the USA say that domestic US services and flights to Milan, Italy, and Berlin, Germany, would follow.
Laker pioneered low-fare air travel across the Atlantic in the late 1970s. He was eventually driven out of business in the face of stiff competition. More recently, Laker and Wyatt have operated a charter airline called Laker Airways (Bahamas) between the USA and the Bahamas, using two, leased Boeing 727-200s.
Laker Airways is expected to operate three McDonnell Douglas DC-10-30s under a leasing deal struck with General Electric's aviation-services financial division.
Wyatt will hold a 51% stake in Laker Airways, with Laker holding the rest. Details of the airline's finances have not been disclosed.
The Orlando-London, Gatwick route is already served by Delta Airlines, British Airways and Virgin Atlantic. The only other competition to be faced by Laker is on the Manchester-Orlando route, which Virgin will enter in mid-1996.
British Airways, one of the carriers accused of forcing his low-cost "Skytrain" service out of the skies in 1982, says that competition is "beneficial". Virgin boss Richard Branson has no such reservations. "I wish him well," he says.
Source: Flight International
