Tyrolean Airways

Anyone who stood at the fence in Innsbruck in the 1980s and 1990s knows the sound of four propellers in the Inn Valley. Tyrolean Airways made the Tyrolean state capital the starting point of one of Europe’s best-known regional airlines – first with the Dash 7, then with a large Dash 8 fleet and later with Fokker jets. In the end, Tyrolean even flew all of Austrian for a short time before being absorbed into it in 2015. This page shows how that came about, which aircraft shaped the airline and how to recognize it in old photos.

Tyrolean Airways at a glance

Tyrolean Airways was an Austrian regional airline based in Innsbruck that flew from 1980 to March 2015. Its home base with maintenance was at Innsbruck Airport, and the hub for connecting traffic later became Vienna Airport. Its trademark was turboprops from De Havilland Canada, which coped well with short runways and mountain valleys.

Tyrolean was not founded as an offshoot of the state airline, but as a private company of the Swarovski family. Only step by step did it grow into the Austrian Airlines group: the first stake in 1994, the full takeover in 1998, then the Austrian Arrows branding. The fleet reached its peak in 2008 with 59 aircraft.

For spotters, Tyrolean is now a chapter from the archive. It remains fascinating, though: because of the Dash 7 that landed at Courchevel, the long Dash 8 era and the curious years from 2012, when a regional operation suddenly had Boeing 777s on its books.

The history in stages

The prehistory begins with the Innsbruck company Aircraft Innsbruck. In 1978, Gernot Langes-Swarovski and Christian Schwemberger-Swarovski bought the business, and in 1979 it was given the name Tyrolean Airways. English-language reference works date the founding of Aircraft Innsbruck as early as 1958. For spotters, one date matters most: scheduled service began on April 1, 1980.

The early years were classic regional flying: the focus was on connecting Tyrol with Vienna and Zurich. As early as 1981, Tyrolean joined Austrian’s reservation system – an early sign of the close ties to come. In 1988 the company became a stock corporation, in which Gernot Langes-Swarovski still held 92 percent. How regional airlines in Europe work in general is explained in the post on regional airlines in Europe.

Codes and callsign

• IATA code VO: appeared in the flight number, on tickets and on departure boards as long as Tyrolean sold under its own name.
• ICAO code TYR: used by air traffic control in the flight plan.
• Callsign TYROLEAN: this is how crews identified themselves on the radio.

A stumbling block for old logbooks: under Austrian Arrows, and even more so from 2012, many Tyrolean flights were sold with Austrian’s OS flight number. So the flight number alone does not tell you who actually operated the flight. If you only noted “OS,” the registration will help.

The Tyrolean fleet

Tyrolean’s fleet is a small history of European regional flying: first four-engine short-takeoff aircraft, then the Dash 8 in three sizes, plus regional jets from Fokker and Bombardier. The overview below gives the periods only approximately, because sources differ by a year or two for individual types.

Type	Period (approx.)	Use	Spotter note
Dash 7	from 1980 into the 1990s	First fleet, mountain airfields such as Courchevel	Four turboprop engines, high-set wing, T-tail
Dash 8-100	from the mid-1980s to 2003	Regional routes	Short fuselage, 37 seats on the first aircraft
Dash 8-300	from 1991 to around 2010	Regional routes	Stretched fuselage, noticeably longer than the 100
Dash 8-400	2000 to 2015	Domestic and neighboring countries	Longest version, kept flying later with Austrian
Fokker 50	mid-1990s	Briefly	Turboprop with six-blade propellers
Fokker 70	from June 1995 to 2015	Jet regional routes	Rear-mounted engines, shorter than the Fokker 100
Fokker 100	from 2004 (first aircraft leased)	Jet regional routes	Longer fuselage than the Fokker 70
CRJ100/200	from 1996 to around 2010	Regional jet routes	Slim fuselage, rear-mounted engines, small cabin windows
ERJ 145	briefly around 2002/2003	Supplement	Only a few aircraft according to fleet lists

The Dash 7 is the aircraft many spotters associate with Tyrolean first. With four turboprop engines and large flaps, it managed with very short runways. From the mid-1980s, Tyrolean also used it for scheduled flights to Courchevel in the French Alps – onto an extremely short, steep mountain strip. How demanding this airfield is shows in the post on Courchevel and the altiports in the Alps.

The Dash 8 was then the workhorse for about three decades. According to German-language sources, the first Dash 8-100 arrived on May 3, 1985, and the first Dash 8-400s followed in 2000. The size differences within the family are easy to see in photos if you watch the fuselage length relative to the wing. The guide Telling the ATR and Dash 8 apart helps with identification.

Among the jets, Tyrolean went with the Fokker 70 – the first arrived on June 13, 1995 – and with Bombardier’s CRJ from 1996. Austrian’s last three Fokker 70s moved to Tyrolean by April 2007. From 2004, the Fokker 100 also appeared in the Tyrolean fleet, with the first aircraft leased. How to tell the different regional jets apart is explained in the post Recognizing regional jets.

From Swarovski company to Austrian subsidiary

The path into the group went in stages. In 1994, Austrian Airlines took a 42.85 percent stake; Gernot Langes-Swarovski AG held the same share, and the rest was with another investor. In the same year, Austrian gave up its own regional subsidiary Austrian Air Service and had its operations absorbed into Tyrolean. That made Tyrolean effectively the regional airline of Austrian aviation.

In March 1998, Austrian finally took over all the shares. Since 2000, the parent company had been a member of Star Alliance, and through it Tyrolean belonged to the alliance network. In the following years, its role continued to change: from 2002, Tyrolean flew as a production company on behalf of the Austrian Airlines Group. In October 2002, Vorarlberg’s Rheintalflug was added. In 2005, Tyrolean received the IATA IOSA safety certification.

Lauda Air, which was also absorbed into the Austrian group, was operating in Vienna as well. Anyone sorting old Vienna photos from the 2000s will therefore often be dealing with several names around Austrian – and should pay close attention to the titles and type.

Austrian Arrows: a brand for the regional fleet

During a brand clean-up in the group, Tyrolean’s own look disappeared. The aircraft now wore the “Austrian arrows” titles and the Austrian tail. When exactly the brand started is given differently: German-language accounts say summer 2002, English-language ones September 2003. Legally, the company remained Tyrolean Airways Tiroler Luftfahrt GmbH with its operating base in Innsbruck.

For you as a spotter, that means: a Dash 8 or a Fokker 70 with “Austrian arrows” is a Tyrolean aircraft, even if the name Tyrolean is not written large anywhere. How group and alliance liveries work in general is shown in the post on Star Alliance, oneworld and SkyTeam liveries.

2012 to 2015: Tyrolean flies all of Austrian

On July 1, 2012, Austrian turned the relationship around. To cut costs, the airline transferred all of its flight operations to its cheaper subsidiary. Tyrolean took over 38 aircraft from its parent – including A320-family Airbus aircraft as well as Boeing 767s and 777s. Only one Boeing 777 stayed with Austrian for air traffic rights reasons. Around 460 pilots and 1,500 flight attendants moved to Tyrolean. Flights continued under the Austrian brand and with OS flight numbers, but with the note “operated by Tyrolean.”

With April 1, 2015, the note “operated by Tyrolean” disappeared from flights. Austrian has been part of the Lufthansa Group since 2009 – so that also ended the chapter of an independent regional airline within the group. Unlike many other historic airlines, this was not a collapse but a reorganization. What real bankruptcies looked like is shown in the post on major airline bankruptcies in Europe.

What remains of Tyrolean

The name has not disappeared entirely. The maintenance base at Innsbruck Airport was spun off on March 1, 2015, as Tyrolean Airways Luftfahrzeuge Technik GmbH, explicitly also to preserve the well-known brand. At the start, around 120 people worked there. The site was regarded as experienced with turboprops, above all the Dash 8.

Many aircraft from the Tyrolean era kept flying in Austrian colors for years after 2015, such as the Dash 8-400 and the Fokkers. If you want to reconstruct a service history today, the best route is the serial number. How that works is shown in the guide How old is this aircraft?.

How to recognize Tyrolean

The surest way to identify Tyrolean aircraft is a combination of period, type and registration. In the early years, the aircraft wore their own livery with “Tyrolean” titles; later the Austrian look with “Austrian arrows” dominated. The Austrian OE registration on the tail is present in all phases.

Tyrolean in today’s spotting routine

For your logbook, Tyrolean is an archive topic – but one with many traces. If you photographed in Innsbruck, you will probably find Dash 7s and Dash 8s in Tyrolean colors among your old slides. It is worth digitizing these pictures and captioning them with type, registration, location and date.

If you want to return to the location today, the observation deck at Innsbruck Airport is a good starting point. In Vienna, the observation deck and the spotters’ hill are options; the guide to plane spotting at Vienna-Schwechat gives an overview.

Common mix-ups

• Equating Tyrolean and Austrian – Tyrolean was a separate company, even if it later flew in Austrian livery.
• Thinking Austrian Arrows was its own airline – it was only a brand; Tyrolean was always behind it.
• Dating the founding to 1980 – scheduled service began in 1980, but the company already existed as Aircraft Innsbruck.
• Thinking Tyrolean went bankrupt – it was merged with Austrian as planned in 2015.
• Attributing every Austrian Boeing 777 between 2012 and 2015 to Tyrolean – one aircraft stayed with Austrian.
• Confusing the Dash 8-100 and -300 – the 300 has a much longer fuselage.

Conclusion

Tyrolean Airways stands for 35 years of regional flying from Tyrol: the Dash 7 on mountain strips, a long Dash 8 era, Fokker and CRJ jets and, in the end, the surprising role as operator of all of Austrian. Looking back is worthwhile for spotters – at old slides from Innsbruck, clean registrations and the aircraft that kept flying in Austrian colors after 2015. You can find more historic Austrian airlines at Lauda Air and Niki, and from Switzerland at Crossair.