Air Berlin one of the leading passenger airliners of Germany took off for the last time on 27 October 2017 after going bankrupt. The last ever flight for Air Berlin was from Munich to Berlin. The airlines flew for 40 years making it the second largest airline in Germany.
Air Berlin Flight AB 6210 was the final ever flight that landed at Berlin-Tegel airport at 23:45 local time. The pilots created a heart-shaped flight path cruising above the Berlin capital and changed the flight number to BER4EVER.
The airlines had to withdraw its legendary service after going bankrupt in 2017. The airlines have had wonderful history but from 2006 it faced some unrecoverable losses. It somehow managed to survive then but now it had been facing a lot of critical issues and financial losses. Last year, Air Berlin reported losses of 781 million euros, or about $916 million U.S., its eighth loss in nine years. According to CAPA, an aviation analysis firm, the airline’s only profit came in 2012, after it sold its loyalty program to Etihad.
The collapse of Germany’s second-largest airline will no doubt please its biggest, Lufthansa, and others with an interest such as TUI Group, Ryanair, and EasyJet.
These airlines have long complained about overcapacity in the German market. Several attempts to alleviate this problem have failed over the years.
“It’s been likely to happen for some time. A relatively high cost market for operators, excess capacity, falling yields, a distant unsupportive shareholder and let time take its course would seem to be the recipe for what has happened,” said aviation consultant John Grant.
After Air Berlin goes through this phase, the leading airline Lufthansa will definitely have some profit as it will be taking control of 81 of 134 jets of Air Berlin. 3000 Air Berlin employees will be taken by Lufthansa but the future of other employees remain in shadow.
