European Aviation Ltd
European Aviation Ltd (EAL) was formed in 1989 by Paul Stoddart. Predominantly an aircraft spares-oriented organisation based in Ledbury, Herefordshire. European then set up an aircraft maintenance division at Bournemouth. In 1993 the decision was made to change European’s name to European Aviation Air Charter (EAAC for short). European Air Charter flew from Bournemouth Airport, making the airport a hub for the airline. The company then expanded its operation into other areas such as flight crew training, maintenance for other operators and leasing and selling aircraft. In 1993, European obtained an Air Operator Certificate (AOC), with its subsidiary airline, European Aviation. Over the next fifteen years, EAAC operated a large fleet of BAC 1-11, B737 and B747 on a variety of scheduled and charter operations. In December, 2008 the airline ceased operations
European Cargo Ltd
From 2018-2020, European acquired a total of sixteen Airbus A340 passenger aircraft from a variety of carriers – Virgin Atlantic, Etihad Airways and Iberia.
European Cargo began operations in April 2020 when its parent company, European Aviation, responded to an urgent charter request by the UK government for PPE transport from Malaysia.
The carrier operated an initial series of freight services with the aircraft which were painted in commemorative liveries as a tribute to the British National Health Service. There then followed over 400 charter flights with both PPE and testing kits.
In 2022, European Cargo began converting its widebody fleet into a permanent freighter configuration (the aircraft had been operating as temporary “preighters” – passenger aircraft temporarily repurposed for freight operations) ,with the first of these certified by the EASA in December of that year.
In April 2023, the first operations commenced with three times weekly flights scheduled between Bournemouth and Chengdu. A second aircraft followed in August and a third in November, all operating on the same routing.
In 2024, the conversion process continues, with six aircraft operational by July and eight by the end of the year.
