British Caledonian was an airline formed from the merger in 1970 of British United Airways and Caledonian Airways. It was formed to compete on international routes against the state monopoly carriers BEA and BOAC. The airline's base was Gatwick Airport, and as an inheritance of the Caledonian Airways roots, there was also an extensive hub operated from Prestwick Airport.

In 1975 when BEA and BOAC were merged into British Airways, BCal found itself under intense monopolistic pressure (see also Laker Airways). Despite this pressure it carried on flying, but never received the government protection or financial support that British Airways received.

British Caledonian created two subsidiary companies to expand into different market segments without diluting its core Scheduled International Airline brand. These were a charter subsidiary and a commuter subsidiary. This behavior was typical in the '70s and '80s when the expanding British charter market was seen as lower class and the scheduled international market was seen as upper class and jetset .

The charter subsidiary was successful, and because it almost uniquely at the time (for a UK charter airline) operated widebody DC-10s, allowed the airline to economically open the Caribbean and Florida holiday markets to UK package holiday customers.

In the 1980s BCal became a major launch company for the Airbus A320, however in 1987, almost co-incident with its receipt of its initial aircraft, the company entered a severe financial crisis and effectively shut down (stranding many passengers).

British Airways stepped in and bought the airline, acquiring its base at Gatwick and its new A320s. The A320's acquisition by British Airways caused some amusement in the aviation industry as BA had resolutely avoided buying Airbus aircraft (often creating rumors of significant sweeteners from Boeing to keep BA as a Boeing jet only company.)

British Airways then absorbed the international scheduled part of BCal into BA, and merged the charter subsidiary with its own British Airtours charter subsidiary, to create Caledonian Airways.

External link

• Detailed history of Caledonian Airways