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| Founded | August 6, 1996 | ||||||
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| Ceased operations | October 4, 2001 | ||||||
| Hubs | Brussels Airport | ||||||
| Subsidiaries | CityBird France | ||||||
| Fleet size | 16 | ||||||
| Destinations | +50 | ||||||
| Parent company | CityBird Holding S.A. | ||||||
| Headquarters | Melsbroek Air Base, Zaventem, Belgium | ||||||
| Key people | Victor Hasson (Chairman & CEO) Georges Gutelman | ||||||
| Employees | +600 (2001) | ||||||
| Website | Former website | ||||||
CityBird S.A. was an airline founded in 1996 and based in Building 117D, Melsbroek Air Base in Zaventem. [1] The airline filed for bankruptcy in October 2001. Thomas Cook Airlines Belgium considered buying them out of bankruptcy, but later pulled out.
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They flew a fleet of twelve aircraft including the Boeing 767-300ER, various Boeing 737 models, the Airbus A300-600R and the McDonnell Douglas MD-11. Over 50 European cities were served via Brussels. Citybird employed over 600 employees as of 2001 and was listed at NASDAQ Europe a.k.a. Eastdaq under the ticker symbol CBIR (CityBird holding SA) in November 1997. Though they had bought their first MD-11 in December 1996, they did not begin operations until March 1997.
Their planes offered a "Royal Eagle" business class, "Premium Flamingo" class (not on Newark flights), and "Colibri" economy class. They used the "point-to-point" approach to air travel rather than the "hub and spoke" connecting hub concept wherein all transatlantic flights (from Los Angeles, Newark, Oakland, Miami, Orlando or Mexico City) went to Brussels Airport (BRU) on an airport to airport basis. All aircraft featured the airline's tagline, "The Flying Dream."
In July 1999, CityBird began cargo activities using two A300-600 "full freighters."
