7 days of fun - Egypt travel information guide

Egypt Air ( مصر للطيران in Arabic) the flag carrier airline and national airways of Egypt was established in 1932 under the name Misr Airwork (Misr مصر is Egypt in Arabic) with a capital of L.E 20,000 of which 85% was put up by Misr Bank, 10% by a British company called Airwork and 5% by Talaat Harb the prominent Egyptian financial figure. Misr Airwork was the seventh air carrier in the world and the first Arab and African air carrier. a flight training school was established in Almaza airport in Cairo and the company started its operations with a voyage of Spartan Cruiser aircraft in 1933 flying from Cairo to Alexandria. In 1935 the company added 12 De Havilland aircrafts to its fleet. In 1936 Misr Airwork started its international services with voyages to Palestine and then Cyprus and Baghdad.

Soon when the second world war erupted the Egyptian government took over the company and changed its name to Misr Airlines which was changed to Misr Air after the war in 1946 adding 10 American built Beechcraft airplanes to its fleet. In 1949 Misr Air 10 Vickers Vikings aircrafts to its air carrier fleet which made it possible for the company to compete with other airlines in the region.

In 1956 the Egyptian government made it a priority to modernize Mis Air with the addition of British built Vickers Viscounts aircrafts and in 1958 the government purchased a fleet of DC-3 aircrafts and a fleet of De Havilland Comet 4 jets for long-haul services in 1960.

In 1961 Misr Air was restructured and merged with Syrian Airways to form the United Arab Airlines (UAA) which started its operations in 1961 and only lasted till the end of that year as the Syrian government have pulled out of the Egypt-Syria union and formed its government owned Syrian Arab Airline. During the Sixties the company suffered due to the foreign exchange difficulties which had an impact of maintaining the current fleet and acquiring modern Boeing 707 aircrafts. The 1967 war struck Egypt and caused development plans to come to a halt and all efforts directed to war although several Arab countries have encouraged their citizens to relieve Egypt of its economic problem by pouring in to spend their holidays in Egypt and thus reviving the tourism industry of the country. Also Arab funds were available to modernize the Egyptian airline with the purchase of 707 airplanes.

in 1970 the name of the company changed to EGYPTAIR which maintains till today. The 1976 peace treaty between Egypt and Israel had some negative effects on Egypt's relations with Arab countries which caused the economy and the company to suffer in face of a fierce competition with Saudi airlines and Gulf air among other modern equipped and large fleets airlines.

During the 1980s ambitious plans were put into action to develop the company started with the purchase in 1981 of Airbus 300 aircrafts, developing Egypt air own terminal in Cairo, introducing computerized reservation system and imposing an ambitious training program for the staff.

In 2002 EGYPTAIR became a Holding Company with seven subsidiaries (two were added later). thus freeing it from the financial grip of the government. In 2008 the company joined the Star alliance network which offered its customers better flight connections thus Egypt Air became the first and only airline in North Africa to be part of this network.

Egypt Air subsidiaries