Blue Air

If you spotted at Cologne/Bonn, Stuttgart or Turin between 2005 and 2022, you know the sight: a Boeing 737 with a Romanian YR registration, regularly lifting off toward Romania. Blue Air was one of Romania’s most important airlines and, for almost 18 years, an affordable link between Romania and the rest of Europe. In September 2022, operations then came to a halt from one day to the next. Here you’ll learn how the airline came about, which 737 versions it flew and how to recognize it on old photos.

Blue Air at a glance

Blue Air was a Romanian low-cost airline based in Bucharest. It was founded by entrepreneur Nelu Iordache in 2004, and operations started in December 2004. The idea was typical for the time: Romania was about to join the EU, hundreds of thousands of people worked in Italy, Spain, Germany or the UK, and connections back home were expensive. Blue Air wanted to change that with cheap tickets and used Boeing 737s.

The hub was initially at Bucharest’s city airport Băneasa, which was then home to the low-cost carriers. In March 2012, Băneasa closed to low-cost airlines, and Blue Air moved to the big Bucharest Henri Coandă Airport in Otopeni. There it shared the field with the national airline TAROM and with Wizz Air, its main competitor in the Romanian low-cost market.

In its best year, 2018, Blue Air carried around 5.2 million passengers according to the English-language Wikipedia. That made it one of the big players in the Romanian market.

Codes and callsign

• IATA code 0B: appeared before flight numbers, on tickets and on departure boards.
• ICAO code BLA: identifier in the air traffic control flight plan and on flight trackers.
• Callsign BLUE AIR: this is how the crews identified themselves on the radio.

The IATA code often causes mistakes when you write it down. The first character is a zero, not a capital O. IATA assigns such digit-and-letter combinations since the pure letter pairs have become scarce. If you search old schedules or logbook entries, you’ll therefore find Blue Air under “0B” and not under “OB.” How IATA and ICAO codes work in general is explained in the article on IATA and ICAO codes.

History: from Băneasa to the shutdown

The start with used 737s (2004–2012)

Blue Air began in December 2004 with a few used Classic-series Boeing 737s. Besides international routes, there were also domestic flights in Romania at first. Blue Air soon dropped those, though: demand was low, and on the short domestic routes the competition from TAROM and the state railway CFR was strong. The focus afterward was on connections between Romania and Western Europe, and domestic flights only returned from 2015.

At the end of 2005 the fleet consisted of three aircraft, and by 2008 it was six. That same year the first Boeing 737-800 arrived. A side path was the turboprop experiment: from 2009 to 2013, Saab 340s of the Romanian operator Direct Aero Services flew for Blue Air, and in 2009 briefly a Saab 2000 leased from Carpatair as well. After that, Blue Air was a pure 737 airline again.

The background to the move from Băneasa to Otopeni in March 2012: fees at the city airport were raised so sharply that the field was practically closed to scheduled airlines.

New owners and growth (2013–2017)

In May 2013, four Romanian investors took over the company and brought around €30 million in fresh capital. Blue Air canceled an existing order for five new Boeing 737s that same year. From 2015, things went steeply uphill: for the first time more than two million passengers flew with Blue Air, and the airline made a profit. In December 2015 it passed IATA’s IOSA safety audit, and in January 2016 it became a full member of IATA.

In 2016 and 2017, Blue Air grew especially fast. The fleet rose to 29 aircraft by the end of 2017, and passenger numbers to over five million. New bases abroad made the airline visible to spotters outside Romania too: in March 2017 Blue Air opened a base in Liverpool, and in the same year Alghero on Sardinia and Constanța on the Black Sea followed. Other foreign bases existed in Turin and Larnaca. However, despite the record numbers, the airline posted heavy losses in both 2016 and 2017.

Air Moldova and the first retreats (2018–2019)

In 2018, Blue Air was converted into a stock corporation, Blue Air Aviation SA. In the same year, a joint venture with Blue Air participation won the privatization of Moldova’s national airline Air Moldova; according to the Romanian-language Wikipedia, Blue Air withdrew again in 2019. A planned Czech subsidiary under the name Blue Air Moravia never got off the ground.

At the same time the retrenchment began. The base in Liverpool closed in February 2019, Alghero in April 2019. The fleet shrank from 29 aircraft at the end of 2017 to 23 at the end of 2019 – the expansion had become too expensive.

COVID, insolvency protection and the MAX 8 (2020–2021)

The COVID pandemic hit Blue Air hard. In 2020, revenue collapsed and passenger numbers fell to around 1.6 million. In July 2020, Blue Air applied for insolvency protection proceedings in order to reach a settlement with its creditors. A state-backed loan of around €65 million was meant to secure liquidity. The bases in Larnaca and Iași were closed.

At the end of 2020, Blue Air announced it would replace the old 737-300s and -500s with leased 737-800s. In 2021, five Boeing 737 MAX 8s also joined the fleet – the most modern aircraft Blue Air ever operated. The last 737-300s left the fleet in the same year.

The end in September 2022

On September 6, 2022, Blue Air halted all operations. The trigger was the seizure of its accounts by the Romanian authorities. This was preceded by a public dispute with the government, in the course of which a high-ranking official had advised against buying Blue Air tickets. The accounts were released again on September 7, but the airline could no longer pay for fuel and services and extended the pause. On September 30, Blue Air took its entire route network off sale. The lessor took back the five 737 MAX 8s and passed them on to LOT Polish Airlines.

In November 2022, the Romanian state announced it would take over 75 percent of the shares because Blue Air could not repay the state-backed loan. By December 2022 the nationalization was complete; the operating license was suspended at that point, but not revoked. Media reports cited debts of up to €250 million. An insolvency filing followed on March 21, 2023. Two stored 737-500s were left behind. How Blue Air fits into the series of big European airline collapses is covered in Major airline collapses in Europe.

The route network

Blue Air was above all an airline for the Romanian diaspora. Most routes connected Bucharest and Romanian regional airports with cities in Italy, Spain, Germany, the UK and other Western European countries. According to the English-language Wikipedia, around 75 scheduled destinations in 21 countries were in the schedule in September 2022. One particularity was routes with no Romanian connection, such as domestic flights in Italy or connections from foreign bases like Turin.

Region	Destinations (selection)	Note
Romania	Bucharest-Otopeni, Bacău, Cluj-Napoca, Iași, Constanța	Hub and regional bases
Germany	Cologne/Bonn, Stuttgart, Munich, Hamburg, Frankfurt, from summer 2022 Düsseldorf	Cologne from Iași, among others, Stuttgart from Sibiu, among others
Italy	Turin, Alghero, Rome Fiumicino	Base in Turin until the end, domestic flight Alghero–Rome from 2017
Cyprus	Larnaca	Base until September 2020
United Kingdom	Liverpool	Base from March 2017 to February 2019

It was the German routes in particular that made Blue Air a regular visitor in Germany. At Cologne/Bonn you can place old Blue Air shots well from the observation deck at Cologne/Bonn Airport, and at Stuttgart from the observation deck at Stuttgart Airport. What things look like at the two airports today is shown in the guides to Cologne/Bonn and Stuttgart.

The fleet: 737s in every generation

Blue Air is a nice example of an airline in which you can read the whole development of the Boeing 737. Most of the fleet was taken over used and leased, and the MAX 8s were by far the youngest aircraft. The fleet size fluctuated widely: from three aircraft at the end of 2005 through 29 at the end of 2017 to two stored aircraft in early 2023.

Type	In service	Generation	Spotter note
Boeing 737-300	2004–2021	Classic	First workhorse, one aircraft in anniversary livery
Boeing 737-400	2006–2020	Classic	Longer Classic version with more seats
Boeing 737-500	until the end	Classic	Shortest Classic, two examples remained until the insolvency
Boeing 737-700	2015–2022	Next Generation	Much rarer than the -800
Boeing 737-800	2008–2022	Next Generation	Backbone of the late fleet, Liverpool special livery
Boeing 737 MAX 8	2021–2022	MAX	Five examples, passed on to LOT after the end
Saab 340	2009–2013	Turboprop	Operated by Direct Aero Services
Saab 2000	2009	Turboprop	Briefly leased from Carpatair

The manufacturer of almost all Blue Air aircraft was Boeing. According to the Romanian-language Wikipedia, the fleet consisted of 20 Boeing aircraft in April 2021; the last retirements of the Classic series followed over the course of the year.

The Classic series: 737-300, -400 and -500

With the 737-300, the 737-400 and the 737-500, Blue Air flew all three important versions of the Classic series. They differ mainly in fuselage length: the -500 is the shortest, the -400 the longest. They share the flattened, oval engine inlets of the CFM56-3 – the typical feature of the Classic generation.

Next Generation: 737-700 and 737-800

The 737-800 was the airline’s most important aircraft in the late years. Rarer was the shorter 737-700, which Blue Air used from 2015. You recognize both by the rounder engines and the redesigned wing; many examples wore upward-curved winglets.

The 737 MAX 8: a short appearance

The five 737 MAX 8s flew for Blue Air for only around a year. Photos of these aircraft in Blue Air colors are therefore much rarer than shots of the older 737s. How to reliably tell the four generations apart is explained in Telling the Boeing 737 Original, Classic, NG and MAX apart.

How to recognize Blue Air

The surest feature is the registration. Blue Air aircraft were registered in Romania and carried the prefix YR-, often in the YR-B.. series, such as the 737-800 YR-BMH. The airline’s name was on the fuselage, and the livery was dominated by shades of blue – fitting the name. Basics on reading registrations can be found in Understanding aircraft registrations.

For collectors there are two well-known special liveries. The 737-800 YR-BMH received its own livery in 2017 for the opening of the Liverpool base, and a 737-300 flew in an anniversary livery for the airline’s tenth birthday. How to document such motifs properly is shown in Collecting and documenting special liveries.

Blue Air in the Romanian market

Blue Air was never alone. The national airline TAROM flew in parallel as a network airline out of Bucharest, and Wizz Air built several large bases in Romania. It was precisely this competition that made life hard for Blue Air: Wizz Air, with newer Airbus aircraft and lower costs, often flew the same diaspora routes. Younger Romanian airlines such as HiSky and AnimaWings are now in the market too. How the low-cost model works in general and why it is so vulnerable to crises is explained in How low-cost carriers work.

Codeshare partners included Blue Panorama from Italy and Georgian Airways, and from the end of 2018 there was also a codeshare with Cyprus Airways. Blue Air never had an alliance membership.

Common mix-ups

• Writing 0B as OB – the first character of the IATA code is a zero.
• Confusing Blue Air with Blue Panorama – Blue Panorama is an Italian airline and was only a codeshare partner.
• Thinking every YR 737 is Blue Air – TAROM also flew Boeing 737s with a Romanian registration. Titles and livery decide.
• Thinking Blue Air was a Wizz Air subsidiary – both were independent competitors in the Romanian market.
• Confusing Classic and Next Generation – at Blue Air both generations flew at the same time; engine shape and wing are the deciding factors.

Conclusion

Blue Air stands for a typical low-cost story of the 2000s and 2010s: a start with used Boeing 737s, rapid growth on the routes of the Romanian diaspora, bold foreign bases – and then a spiral of losses, the pandemic and a dispute with the state. The abrupt stop in September 2022 ended almost 18 years of operations. For spotters, what remains is an airline whose fleet lets you trace the history of the 737 from the Classic to the MAX.