Global Airlines

While many airlines retired their A380s long ago, a British startup buys exactly this aircraft – and flies it from Glasgow to New York in May 2025. Global Airlines is one of the quirkiest stories in recent aviation: a single jet, no air operator certificate of its own, a large social media fan base and a future that is open in fall 2026. Here you’ll learn what is behind the project, what history the A380 registered 9H-GLOBL has and why it is one of the rarest sightings you can have in your logbook.

Global Airlines at a glance

Global Airlines is a British airline startup based in London. According to the UK commercial register, the company Global Airlines Limited was registered in July 2019. Founder and CEO is James Asquith, an entrepreneur and frequent traveler who previously founded the travel platform Holiday Swap. Asquith appears on social media as the face of the project and generated a lot of attention early on – long before the first aircraft took off.

The idea: a long-haul airline with a premium claim that bets on the Airbus A380 – exactly the aircraft that many large airlines weeded out during and after the pandemic. Supporters point out that used A380s are comparatively cheap to get and that many passengers like the aircraft for its quiet and space. Critics, on the other hand, point to the high operating costs of four engines, the costly maintenance and the difficulty of filling more than 500 seats.

Important for understanding: Global Airlines still has no AOC of its own, that is, no air operator certificate from the British aviation authority CAA. Without this document a company may not operate commercial flights itself. What an AOC is and why it is so hard to get is explained in the article on AOC and operating licenses.

Codes and callsign

With Global Airlines it pays to take a close look at the codes, because here the brand and the operating company diverge:

• Own IATA or ICAO code: No airline code of its own that is officially used is documented for Global Airlines. Without an AOC the brand does not fly under an identifier of its own.
• Flight number HFM380: The flights in May 2025 ran under the identifier HFM380. HFM stands for Hi Fly Malta, the Maltese company of the Portuguese Hi Fly group.
• Registration 9H-GLOBL: The prefix 9H- stands for Malta. The A380 is registered there because Hi Fly Malta lists it as operator.

For you as a spotter this means: if you search a flight tracker for “Global Airlines”, you often find nothing. Searching for the registration or the aircraft’s hex code is more reliable. How that works is shown in the guide Tracking an aircraft by registration.

The aircraft: 9H-GLOBL and its history

The story of Global Airlines is above all the story of a single aircraft. The A380 with the serial number MSN 120 has already had an eventful life:

When	Stage
September 2012	First flight in Toulouse
February 2013	Delivery to China Southern as B-6140
November 2022	Retirement from China Southern
December 2022 to April 2024	Parked in Mojave, California
January/February 2024	Transfer to Global Airlines, registered as 9H-GLOBL with Hi Fly Malta as operator
April 30 / May 1, 2024	Ferry flight from Mojave via Montreal to Glasgow Prestwick
October 2024 to January 2025	Work in Dresden
January to May 2025	Stay in Beja, Portugal, completion of the paint job
May 2025	Positioning and transatlantic flights
July 16, 2025	Flight from Dresden to Tarbes, parked ever since

Global Airlines had announced the purchase as early as May 2023. Still, two years passed until the first flight with passengers. One reason: for an aircraft this size there are only a few shipyards and paint hangars – more in the overview of maintenance facilities and shipyards in Europe.

Technically the aircraft remained largely as China Southern had operated it. It has four Rolls-Royce Trent 970s. In the delivery configuration the A380 offered 8 First, 70 Business and 428 Economy seats – 506 seats in total. Global Airlines took over this configuration and the engines in the purchase; on the 2025 flights too, the cabin still largely dated from the China Southern era.

The livery: step by step to “GLOBAL”

What makes it especially exciting for spotters is that the aircraft was on the move in several intermediate stages. That turns older photos of 9H-GLOBL into small historical documents:

When you sort old photos, pay attention to the date: a picture from Prestwick in 2024 shows a different aircraft outfit than a picture from Manchester in 2025, even though it’s the same registration. Differences like these are exactly what make collections of special liveries and livery changes interesting.

How Global Airlines flies: damp lease with Hi Fly

Because Global Airlines has no AOC of its own, the startup needed a partner. It found one in Hi Fly, a Portuguese specialist in wet lease and charter that once operated an A380 itself. The flights were operated by the Maltese subsidiary Hi Fly Malta – on a so-called damp lease: Hi Fly provided the crew as operator, while Global Airlines contributed aircraft, brand and product.

For passengers this was a setup with quirks. Global Airlines could only offer round-trip charter flights from Europe, no regular scheduled flights – for the difference see Charter vs. scheduled flights. The tickets were sold by a partner via a booking page of its own. How such models work and which variants exist is explained in the article Wet lease explained.

The first flights in May 2025

In early May 2025, 9H-GLOBL finally got moving. On May 2 the A380 left Beja, and shortly afterward came a charter flight from Barcelona to Berlin, among others. Then came the big moment:

• May 15, 2025: First flight with paying passengers, from Glasgow to New York JFK, flight number HFM380.
• May 19, 2025: Return flight from New York to Glasgow.
• May 21, 2025: One-off flight from Manchester to New York.
• May 25, 2025: Return flight to Manchester.

On board there were three classes: First, Business and Economy. Reactions were mixed: many enjoyed the experience, others criticized worn seats, a missing inflight entertainment program and long service times – consequences of the cabin largely dating from the China Southern era.

For spotters these days were a feast. At Manchester Airport the Runway Visitor Park was the place to be, and in New York spotters like to head to the TWA Hotel – more tips in the guide Plane spotting in New York. How to plan for one-off events like this is shown in the article Spotting farewell and first flights.

Status in October 2026: parked in Tarbes

After the flights in May 2025 the A380 flew to Dresden for further maintenance work. On July 16, 2025, it went from there to Tarbes-Lourdes in southwestern France. The airport is known as a storage and dismantling site for retired widebody aircraft, including other A380s.

Since then 9H-GLOBL has not flown commercially. The A380 needs a 12-year check, a heavy maintenance in which the aircraft is comprehensively opened up and inspected. How such checks work is explained in the article on aircraft maintenance. Global Airlines cites a lack of shipyard capacity as the main reason for the delay. In June 2026 the company stated that it wanted to start the check by the end of 2026. Asquith also named as goals getting the A380 back in the air in 2026, adding a second aircraft and launching a route from Britain to the Maldives. By fall 2026 none of these goals had been realized.

Legal questions are added to this: on May 29, 2026, a creditor applied to the competent British court to wind up Global Airlines Ltd. Hearings were scheduled for July and September 2026; no result was publicly known by October 2026. Earlier petitions of this kind were withdrawn, according to reports. Global Airlines also still has no AOC of its own – but the company expects to continue the partnership with Hi Fly in some form.

How to recognize Global Airlines

Because there is only one aircraft, recognition is actually simple – if you get it in front of your lens at all:

• Type: Airbus A380-800, the only full double-deck passenger aircraft, with four engines.
• Registration: 9H-GLOBL – the 9H- gives away the Maltese registration.
• Titles: “GLOBAL” on the fuselage, logo on the tail.
• Tracker: no airline identifier of its own, instead the HFM identifier of Hi Fly Malta or just the registration.
• Backstory: you’ll find photos from the China Southern era under B-6140; in the phase between retirement and the Global takeover, the aircraft was also briefly listed with a US registration.

If you collect registrations, it’s best to log the whole chain for 9H-GLOBL: B-6140, the interim US registration and 9H-GLOBL. Background on registration changes can be found in the article on re-registrations, and you can judge how rare a sighting like this is with the guide to rare aircraft.

Global Airlines in comparison

Global Airlines is not the first British airline with big long-haul dreams. Virgin Atlantic also started in 1984 with a single used widebody jet – a Boeing 747 – and became an established name on the North Atlantic. The difference: Virgin flew scheduled service from the start. Global Airlines, by contrast, is so far a brand with an aircraft but without an operating license of its own.

A look at the previous owner is also interesting. China Southern was the only Chinese airline with the A380 and has retired its entire fleet of this type. While many retired A380s have since been dismantled, MSN 120 got a second chance through Global Airlines. Whether it is used is decided by shipyard slots, approvals and financing. The manufacturer Airbus ended A380 production in 2021 – so every flying example is, for spotters, a piece that will disappear at some point.

Common misunderstandings

• Taking Global Airlines for a scheduled airline – so far there were only charter flights in May 2025, no regular schedule.
• “Global Airlines flies by itself” – Hi Fly Malta did the flying, Global Airlines has no AOC of its own.
• Looking for an airline code of its own on the tracker – the flights ran under HFM, the registration is the safer way.
• Taking 9H-GLOBL for a Maltese airline’s aircraft – the prefix comes from the operator Hi Fly Malta, not from a Maltese brand.
• Assigning every British A380 to Global – it is almost always British Airways or Emirates on approach to British airports.

Conclusion

Global Airlines shows how much enthusiasm a single aircraft can trigger – and how hard it is to turn enthusiasm into an airline. The A380 9H-GLOBL completed four transatlantic flights in 2025 and has been parked in Tarbes ever since. Whether it returns depends on the big check, on an AOC of its own or a lasting partner, and on financing. Until then it remains, for you as a spotter, one of the rarest A380 sightings of all.