Lynx Air

Lynx Air is one of those airlines that disappeared faster than many spotters could log it. In April 2022 the first aircraft took off in Calgary, and by February 2024 it was all over. In between lay almost two years with a small, very uniform fleet of Boeing 737 MAX 8s – and a backstory reaching back to 2006. This page places the airline in context, shows how to recognize its aircraft in old photos and explains why the model did not work out.

Lynx Air at a glance

Lynx Air was a Canadian ultra-low-cost airline based in Calgary. It flew from April 7, 2022 to the end of February 2024 and used exclusively the Boeing 737 MAX 8. Its bases were Calgary and Toronto Pearson Airport. The business model followed the pattern of the big low-cost carriers in the US and Europe: low base fares, extra charges for baggage and extras, a single aircraft family and point-to-point routes instead of connecting traffic through a hub.

Legally, the brand was backed by the company 1263343 Alberta Inc., which was 100 percent owned by the holding company Lynx Air Holdings Corporation. This holding company had been founded in December 2018 under the name Enerjet Holdco. The most important backer was the US private equity firm Indigo Partners, internationally known for its stakes in low-cost airlines – including Wizz Air, Frontier Airlines, Volaris and JetSMART.

Codes and callsign

• IATA code Y9: appeared in the flight number, so on tickets, departure boards and in schedules.
• ICAO code DAT: appeared in the air traffic control flight plan and on flight trackers.
• Callsign DAUNTLESS: this is how Lynx crews checked in on the radio.

The code and callsign have nothing to do with the name “Lynx” – that happens more often with airlines that emerge from an older company or are renamed. Anyone analyzing historical tracker data or radio recordings therefore needs to know that “DAUNTLESS” belongs to Lynx Air. How IATA and ICAO codes work in general is explained in the article on IATA and ICAO codes; the post on airline callsigns and their history collects curious callsigns.

From Enerjet to Lynx Air

The history of Lynx Air begins long before the first flight under this name. In 2006, nine people in Calgary founded the company New Air & Tours, including a former manager of WestJet. In October 2008 it was renamed Enerjet, and in November 2008 it received its air operator certificate.

Even back then, Enerjet actually wanted to offer scheduled flights at low prices. In practice it became mainly a charter business: Enerjet flew oil company workers to the mining areas in northern Alberta and took on ad hoc charters, including for Air Transat. For this the airline used several Boeing 737-700s between 2008 and 2017, and at times also a leased 737-800. Two Twin Otters briefly joined later.

The actual restart gained momentum at the end of 2018, when investors such as Indigo Partners came on board. The goal was clear: a Canadian ultra-low-cost airline with factory-new 737 MAXs. Then everything turned out differently. In March 2019 the 737 MAX was grounded worldwide, and a year later the pandemic brought air travel to a halt. The first flight slipped by almost three years – years in which costs accrued but there was no revenue.

On November 16, 2021, the company presented itself under the new name Lynx Air. In March 2022 a lease agreement with BOC Aviation for more 737 MAX 8s was added, and on April 7, 2022, the first scheduled flight departed from Calgary to Vancouver.

Route network: first Canada, then the sun

Lynx Air began with domestic flights. In the first weeks, Toronto, Kelowna and Winnipeg quickly joined Calgary and Vancouver, and in summer 2022 Edmonton, Halifax, St. John’s and Hamilton followed, among others. In 2023 the airline expanded the network to Montreal and Fredericton.

Lynx Air announced the step across the border in September 2022. From early 2023 the airline flew to the US, including Orlando, Phoenix, Los Angeles and Las Vegas, and in winter 2023/24 also to Tampa and Fort Myers in Florida. That is the classic pattern of Canadian low-cost carriers: in winter customers are drawn to the sun, and in summer domestic routes and Atlantic Canada fill the aircraft. The last new destination was Cancún in Mexico in mid-February 2024 – only a few days before the creditor protection filing.

For spotters in western Canada, Lynx Air was thus one of the airlines you could regularly get in front of your lens at the Larry Berg Flight Path Park in Vancouver – alongside Air Canada, WestJet and Flair Airlines.

The fleet: Boeing 737 MAX 8 only

The fleet was simply structured, exactly as the ultra-low-cost model demands. At the end, Lynx Air flew nine leased Boeing 737 MAX 8s, plus three leased spare engines of the type CFM LEAP-1B. The aircraft were configured in a single class with 189 seats.

Type	Period	Number	Spotter note
Boeing 737 MAX 8	2022–2024	9 in service (February 2024)	Only Lynx type, all aircraft leased
Boeing 737 MAX (purchase agreement)	–	40 agreed	Six-year agreement, 29 aircraft still undelivered at the end, terminated in April 2024
Boeing 737-700	2008–2017	several	Only in the Enerjet era
Boeing 737-800	2011, 2013–2014	one, leased	Only in the Enerjet era

Besides the nine aircraft in service, there were bigger plans. Lynx Air had an agreement with Boeing for 40 aircraft of the 737 MAX family, as well as a sale-and-leaseback agreement with BOC Aviation for eight aircraft with planned delivery in 2024. According to reference works, the orders also included the 737-8-200, which can be configured with especially dense seating – Lynx Air never flew it.

One detail from fall 2023 is interesting: in September, Lynx Air concluded a comprehensive technical fleet support agreement with Delta Air Lines. Big network airlines also offer such services to third parties through their maintenance departments. The articles on the low-cost carrier business model and on aircraft leasing explain how low-cost carriers outsource costs and why leasing is so important for young airlines.

How to recognize Lynx Air

The livery was plain: white fuselage with large “Lynx” titles and a tail in a contrasting color. Because descriptions of the color tones differ, the best way to check an uncertain shot is against dated archive photos of known Lynx registrations. Lynx Air can be clearly distinguished from Flair, which relies on neon green and black.

Because all Lynx aircraft were 737 MAX 8s, the aircraft type also helps you sort old photos. You recognize the MAX by the large LEAP engines with a serrated trailing edge on the cowling and by the split winglets with one tip pointing up and one pointing down. The comparison Boeing 737 Original, Classic, NG and MAX shows how to cleanly tell the 737 generations apart.

The end: creditor protection in February 2024

On February 22, 2024, the Lynx companies applied to the Court of King’s Bench of Alberta for protection under Canada’s Companies’ Creditors Arrangement Act (CCAA). The court granted it the same day and appointed the advisory firm FTI Consulting Canada as monitor, which oversees the proceedings and reports regularly.

Instead of shutting down immediately, Lynx Air planned an orderly exit: four days of wind-down operations until the end of February 25, 2024, so that as many passengers as possible still reached their destinations and others could look for alternatives. That did not fully work out. Some service providers refused or delayed their services after the filing, and with airlines that cannot be replaced overnight. According to the monitor, around 64 of 115 planned flights were operated, carrying about 10,000 passengers, while 51 flights were canceled. The flights to the US were canceled completely early on; they accounted for a large share of the cancellations.

After that, things moved fast. Around 435 employees lost their jobs in the days after the filing, and a small team of about 15 people stayed on to maintain the aircraft, keep the operating certificate and process refunds.

Why the model did not work

The court filings name several reasons. A central point was the long ramp-up: because of the MAX grounding and the pandemic, Lynx Air launched almost three years later than planned. During that time, jet fuel prices also rose considerably. At the end, the airline itself additionally pointed to rising costs and higher airport fees.

The numbers show how tight things were. At the end of 2023, according to the monitor, liabilities of around 600 million Canadian dollars faced assets of about 429 million. These included lease obligations for aircraft and engines as well as secured loans from Indigo Partners of around 93 million Canadian dollars. With nine aircraft, Lynx Air was also too small to benefit from the economies of scale that the low-cost model actually relies on.

Competition came on top of that. Canada’s low-cost market was more crowded than ever in those years: WestJet ran its own ultra-low-cost subsidiary with Swoop, Flair Airlines was growing with the 737 MAX, and Air Canada Rouge served the leisure destinations. Swoop was already folded back into WestJet in 2023, and Lynx Air disappeared in early 2024 – two clear signs of how hard low-cost carriers have it in a sparsely populated country with long distances.

What became of the aircraft

After the last day of operations, all nine 737 MAX 8s stood in Calgary. A dispute with the airport operator over parking fees flared up immediately: Lynx Air wanted to pay the apron fees agreed so far, while the airport demanded considerably more. The solution came from the lessors: they took on the costs of ferrying and storage, and the fleet was flown around the turn of February to March 2024 to the area of Tucson, Arizona, where the dry desert climate makes storing aircraft easier.

A rescue of the airline did not come about in the subsequent sale process. The lessors announced they would repossess their aircraft under the international Cape Town Convention, and by early May 2024 termination agreements were signed for all lease contracts. The aircraft thus went back to their owners and could be leased to other airlines. What remained were mainly contracts and equipment parts such as wheels and brakes, which were liquidated in the proceedings.

For spotters this means: the Lynx aircraft have not been scrapped but keep flying – in other colors, in some cases with a new registration. If you know a former Lynx registration, you can follow its further path via the serial number. The articles tracking an aircraft by registration and re-registrations show how.

Lynx Air as a collector’s item

If you collect airlines, Lynx Air is a nice but tricky piece. The airline flew for less than two years, with only nine aircraft and no notable presence outside North America. It never showed up in scheduled service in Europe. A Lynx sighting therefore almost always comes from a spotting trip to Canada, the US or – very rarely – Cancún. The articles How rare is my sighting? and Collecting airlines explain how to classify such sightings.

Common mix-ups

• Confusing Lynx Air with Flair Airlines – both were Canadian low-cost carriers with 737 MAX 8s, but Flair flies in neon green and black, while Lynx flew with a white fuselage and large “Lynx” titles.
• Confusing Lynx Air with SmartLynx – SmartLynx is a Latvian ACMI airline and has nothing to do with Canada’s Lynx Air.
• Counting Enerjet and Lynx as two airlines – the same company is legally behind both; only the name, model and fleet changed.
• Not being able to place DAT or DAUNTLESS – the ICAO code and callsign do not fit the brand name but belong to Lynx Air.
• Taking Lynx Air for a WestJet brand – Lynx was independent; WestJet’s ultra-low-cost subsidiary was called Swoop.

Conclusion

Lynx Air was an ambitious attempt to establish an ultra-low-cost airline in Canada on the model of Frontier or Wizz Air. Its backstory as Enerjet goes back to 2006, but actual scheduled service lasted not even two years. Three lost years due to the MAX grounding and the pandemic, expensive fuel, high costs and tough competition left the small fleet too little room to maneuver. For spotters, a short, well-defined era remains – and nine 737 MAX 8s that now keep flying with other operators.