Augsburg Airways

If you saw a Dash 8 with the crane on its tail in Munich between 1996 and 2013, there is a good chance you photographed Augsburg Airways – even if the name hardly stands out in the picture. For years the Bavarian regional airline flew almost exclusively for Lufthansa, in Lufthansa colors and under LH flight numbers. That is exactly what makes it a small detective case today for spotters sorting their old photos. This page shows you where the airline came from, which aircraft it flew and how to recognize it in the archive.

Augsburg Airways at a glance

Augsburg Airways was a German regional airline that began in 1980 as Interot Airways in Augsburg. At the start there was no scheduled service, but a corporate flight service: the paper manufacturer Haindl needed fast connections for its people, mainly between Augsburg and Düsseldorf. In 1986 this company flight became a public route, and over the years the small route operation became one of the most important regional partners of Lufthansa.

The airline had two very different lives. In the first, it flew under its own name out of Augsburg airfield to German and a few European destinations. In the second, it was almost invisible: from the mid-1990s it flew as part of Team Lufthansa, later as Lufthansa Regional, and from 2002 its home was no longer in Augsburg but at Munich Airport. In 2008 the company headquarters also moved to Hallbergmoos near the airport.

At the end of October 2012, Lufthansa terminated the cooperation. A year later, on October 26, 2013, Augsburg Airways flew its last scheduled flight – after 33 years it was over.

The history in stages

The history of Augsburg Airways can be told well in stations – from corporate flight through its own routes to contract flying for the crane.

Codes and callsign

• IATA code IQ: appeared in the flight numbers of the airline’s own Augsburg years. In the Lufthansa era, most flights for passengers ran under LH.
• ICAO code AUB: appeared in the air traffic control flight plan and shows up in old tracker data.
• Callsign AUGSBURG AIR: this is how the crew identified itself on the radio. You can read more about such radio names in the article on airline callsigns.

For spotting practice, the difference between flight number and ICAO code is decisive. An LH flight number only tells you who sold the flight – not who operates it. The principle is similar to a codeshare. If you have old photos from Munich with the crane look but no note on the operator, registrations and schedule data help.

The Augsburg Airways fleet

The fleet reflects the airline’s development quite precisely: first small propeller aircraft for business travelers, then regional turboprops for scheduled service and finally jets for the longer Lufthansa routes out of Munich.

Type	Period	Role	Spotter note
Beechcraft King Air	from 1986	first scheduled flights Augsburg–Düsseldorf	Twin-engine turboprop, really a business aircraft
Beechcraft 1900	1987 to 1996	Expansion of the domestic network	Slim 19-seater with a long fuselage
Dash 8-100	from 1990	first “real” regional aircraft	Short fuselage, high-wing with T-tail
Dash 8-300	until 2009/2010	Team Lufthansa years	Stretched version, two aircraft went to Bangladesh in 2010
Dash 8-400 (Q400)	from 2000 to 2013	Backbone of the Lufthansa Regional fleet	Very long fuselage, six-bladed propellers
Embraer 190	from 2009 to 2013	Jet routes out of Munich	Shorter E-Jet version
Embraer 195	from 2009 to 2013	Jet routes out of Munich	Longest first-generation E-Jet, went to Lufthansa CityLine in 2013

At the end, in October 2013, there were 15 aircraft in the fleet: eight Dash 8-400s, two Embraer 190s and five Embraer 195s. The E-Jets were the only jets Augsburg Airways ever operated. Already around 2000, the airline had evaluated regional jets like the CRJ200, the ERJ 135 or the 328JET, but decided against an order at the time.

The Dash 8-400 was the aircraft you most associate with Augsburg Airways. It mainly flew the shorter routes out of Munich, such as to Dresden, Stuttgart, Paderborn, Budapest or Wrocław. The Embraer 195, by contrast, took over destinations like Basel, Geneva, Graz, London City, Prague, Turin and Zurich. The smaller Embraer 190 rounded out the fleet. Both jets come from the Brazilian manufacturer Embraer.

From the early years, it is worth a look at the Dash 8-100 and the Dash 8-300, both of which come from the Canadian manufacturer De Havilland Canada. Right at the beginning, the airline flew the Beechcraft King Air 200 family – a type you know today more as a business or air ambulance aircraft.

Documented registrations

A complete fleet list with all registrations does not exist in a single official source. Some registrations are well documented through photos and trade reports, however:

Registration	Type	What is known about it
D-AEMA	Embraer 195	The airline’s first E195, taken over on June 9, 2009, in Lufthansa Regional colors
D-AEMD	Embraer 195	Serial number 19000305, photographed in Geneva in 2010, among other places
D-ADHE	Dash 8-400	Q400 from the Lufthansa Regional era, documented by photos with Augsburg Airways titles
D-ADHT	Dash 8-400	Serial number 4281, flew the last flight on October 26, 2013, with a farewell inscription
D-BEBA	Dash 8-300	Sold to Regent Airways in Bangladesh in 2010
D-BLEJ	Dash 8-300	Sold to Regent Airways in Bangladesh in 2010

The pattern stands out: the Q400s carried D-ADH… registrations, the Embraers D-AEM…. The Dash 8-300s, by contrast, had registrations with D-B, because they fell into a lighter weight class. Why the second letter of German registrations reveals the weight is explained in the article on German aircraft registrations.

How to recognize Augsburg Airways

For many years the airline had no striking livery of its own. That is the biggest hurdle when identifying old photos. From 1996 the aircraft wore the Team Lufthansa livery with the partner’s name on the fuselage, later the Lufthansa Regional look: white fuselage, crane on the tail and the title “Lufthansa Regional”. The name Augsburg Airways could only be read in small letters.

With the Q400, it is worth comparing with other turboprops. Within the Lufthansa Regional network, other partners also flew propeller aircraft, and if you cannot reliably tell the Dash 8 and ATR apart, you quickly sort wrongly. The guide telling the ATR and Dash 8 apart shows the most important features. For the jets, the article telling Embraer E-Jets apart helps: the E195 is clearly longer than the E190, which you can see well from the number of windows ahead of and behind the wing.

Routes and stations

In the airline’s own Augsburg years, the focus was on domestic routes for business travelers: Düsseldorf, Hamburg, Cologne/Bonn, Berlin Tempelhof and, after German reunification, also Dresden and Leipzig. In the mid-1990s the first international destinations were added, including Florence, Birmingham and London City. In 2000 the airline counted almost a million passengers.

With the move to Munich, the picture changed. Augsburg Airways now flew feeder routes into the Lufthansa hub. At the time of the termination in 2012, it served around 35 to 37 destinations in Germany and Europe from Munich – the figures vary depending on the source – from Dresden and Paderborn to Graz, Prague, Turin and London City.

There were also individual contracts outside the Lufthansa network. In 2009 a Q400 flew for Brussels Airlines between Hanover and Brussels. And in its last year, Augsburg Airways based a Q400 at Nuremberg Airport: from April to October 2013 it flew several times a day to Zurich on behalf of Swiss.

Why Lufthansa ended the cooperation

In the end, Augsburg Airways was Lufthansa’s last independent feeder in Munich. That was both strength and risk: the airline had a large, reliable client but hardly a second pillar.

At the end of October 2012, the termination letter arrived from Frankfurt. Lufthansa wanted to fly European traffic out of Munich from fall 2013 with its own companies, mainly Lufthansa CityLine and Air Dolomiti. Around 450 employees were affected, including about 150 pilots. No new major customer was found. Other independent Lufthansa partners fared similarly at the time – the model of outside feeders was being phased out. You can read more background in the overview of regional airlines in Europe and on the page about the Lufthansa Group.

The last day

On October 26, 2013, Augsburg Airways flew its last scheduled flight out of Munich. The Q400 D-ADHT carried a farewell inscription for the occasion, and employees saw the aircraft off on the ground. Two days later, on October 28, 2013, the airline ferried the Q400 fleet and one Embraer 190 to Maastricht Aachen Airport – with a formation flyover of Munich as a farewell. The Q400s went back to their lessors and later found new operators, and the two Embraers it owned itself went to a dealer.

Flight operations ended on October 31, 2013, and liquidation began on December 30, 2013. The name still exists, however: in 2021 an Augsburg charter broker secured the trademark rights and arranges business and private jet flights under the name. That is not an airline with aircraft of its own.

Spotting today: traces in Munich

You will no longer see Augsburg Airways itself. The airline remains exciting all the same, for two reasons. First, many archives hold pictures filed as “Lufthansa” that actually show Augsburg Airways. If you update your collection cleanly, you gain a historic airline. You will find tips for a sensible filing system in the article archiving aircraft photos.

Second, many former aircraft keep flying, just in other colors. If you know a registration or serial number, you can research where it is today. Good starting points for regional traffic in Munich are the visitors’ hill at Munich Airport and the plane spotting guide for Munich – right where Augsburg Airways spent its last eleven years.

Common mix-ups

• Thinking every Lufthansa Regional Q400 is Augsburg Airways – other partners also flew under the brand. The registration decides.
• Equating Augsburg Airways with Lufthansa CityLine – CityLine was a Lufthansa subsidiary, Augsburg Airways an independent partner.
• Logging an E195 with D-AEM after 2013 as Augsburg – the jets flew for CityLine from the end of October 2013.
• Confusing IQ with LH – IQ was the airline’s own IATA code, LH appeared only in the flight number of the Lufthansa flights.
• Thinking today’s brand is an airline – under the name, only charter flights are arranged now.

Conclusion

Augsburg Airways stands for an entire era of German regional aviation: from the corporate flight of a paper group through its own routes out of Augsburg to the feeder service for Lufthansa in Munich. Because the aircraft almost always flew in Lufthansa colors, the airline is easy to overlook in the archive. With the registration, the date and a close look at the type, you can still assign your photos with confidence.