Air Hong Kong

Air Hong Kong Limited, abbreviated AHK, is the only all-cargo airline based in Hong Kong. It operates regional overnight express and freight services. Its main base is Hong Kong International Airport. The airline was established in 1986 and started operations in February 1988 with Boeing 707 aircraft. Scheduled services were added in 1989. Two Boeing 747-100F and two Boeing 747-200F aircraft were used until 2004. 75% of the company's share was acquired by Cathay Pacific in June 1994, followed by the remaining 25% in February 2002. In October 2002 Cathay Pacific entered into a business partnership with DHL to develop the express freight network in Asia and at that time, and in March 2003, 30% of the company's shares were acquired by DHL. AHK was the launch customer for the Airbus A300-600GF general freighter which is a new variant of the Airbus A300F4-600R. The eighth, and the last aircraft was delivered on the 28 June 2006, with the registration code B-LDH. This new variant has a cargo loading system capable of handling almost every type of container and pallet, and a side door at the rear of the lower deck capable of handling large items of general freight, and is being delivered from second half of 2004.

AHK selected the CF6-80C2 engines from General Electric, and signed on to GE's Maintenance Cost Per Hour (MCPH) programme. The airline is owned by Cathay Pacific (60%) and DHL International GmbH (40%) and has 96 employees (at March 2007). In 1946 Jardine Air Maintenance Company (JAMCo) had been formed to serve the rapidly expanding portfolio of airlines serving Hong Kong and Jardine Airways was formed as the General Sales Agent in Hong Kong and China of BOAC and other carriers. HKA was formed in 1947, by BOAC and Jardine, Matheson & Co.(??). Jardines wanted to develop a Hong Kong carrier with the support of a British government backed enterprise. BOAC wanted to create a feeder carrier to transport passengers from their London to Hong Kong service to onward destinations in China and the Far East. Additionally the government in London wanted to develop a new market for British manufactured aircraft. Jardines were General Sales Agents of HKA and became owners before selling to government backed partner BOAC."On 13 May 1949 an agreement was signed by Cathay Pacific (Jock Swire) and BOAC (on behalf of Hong Kong Airways) along Grantham's (@) lines of allocation.

Cathay secured the valuable routes to and from Bangkok, Singapore, Haiphong, Saigon, Sandakan, Jesselton (now Kota Kinabalu) and Labuan, and Rangoon (with an extension possible to Calcutta). That left HKA with Canton, Macao, Shanghai and Tientsin, not, after all, Japan. The 'Battle of Hong Kong Airways', as Jock called it, did not end here. It dragged on for another ten years. In November 1949 BOAC sold Hong Kong Airways back to Jardines, but it soon ran for cover to another 'big brother', in a charter association with the American company Northwest Airlines on the Taipei and Tokyo services. Absurdly, HKA was still an airline without planes of its own. Then in 1953, the British Government attempted to bring about a merger between Cathay Pacific, BOAC and Hong Kong Airways to form a single regional airline. This came to nothing for two reasons: first, disaster hit BOAC in the quick succession of two Comet jets and a Constellation, and, secondly, Hong Kong Airways was doomed to be a dead loss in anyone's hands. Later still, BOAC came back having decided to try once more to bring Hong Kong Airways to profitable life.

Two new short-range Viscounts arrived in Hong Kong in an attempt to make something of the Tokyo route. But there was still no profit in that, and finally Lord Rennell of BOAC meekly approached Jock Swire to ask if he would be willing to swap Hong Kong Airways for a parcel of Cathay Pacific shares. Jock said he considered Hong Kong Airways worthless and a liability, but nevertheless, as of 1 July 1959, Cathay Pacific took over Hong Kong Airways though spurning the two Viscounts - and BOAC got 15 per cent of Cathay Pacific's shares and a seat on the Board." "Characteristically, Jardines was a pioneer of air travel in the Far East. As early as the 1918 Armistice, CH Ross (then in charge in London) commissioned a feasibility study for a Jardine air service to run in conjunction with Vickers - for whom the firm were agents - from Hong Kong to Shanghai via the coastal ports. And later, when Imperial Airways

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