The Ansett Timeline
1936 Reginald Myles Ansett founded Ansett. The first flight was on Feb 17, 1936 Hamilton to Melbourne.
1937 Ansett Airways moved its headquarters to Essendon Airport, Melbourne. Launched a service to Sydney.
1942 Ansett assisted in the evacuation of Darwin after it was bombed by Japan in WW2
1947 Ansett began developing Holiday resorts in the Whitsundays.
1950 Ansett opened the Royal Hayman Hotel
1953 Ansett introduced the flying boat service in Queensland.
1954 Ansett introduced its first pressurised aircraft the Convair 340.
1957 Ansett bought Australian National Airways (ANA), which was the biggest airline in the country at the time, and changed its name to Ansett-ANA
1958 Ansett fleet grew to 43 aircraft including two helicopters.
1960 Ansett began Australia's first airport to city helicopter service
1961 Ansett began flights from Australia to Papua New Guinea
1964 Ansett's first Boeing 727-100 goes into service.
1967 Ansett's first Douglas DC-9 goes into service
1972 Ansett moved its operation to Tullamarine, Victoria where it built a new base.
1973 Ansett began replacing the Boeing 727-100s with newer Boeing 727-200s.
1974 Ansett again helped evacuate Darwin after Cyclone Tracy.
1979 Control of Ansett passed to The News Corporation Limited and TNT Limited.
1981 Sir Reginald Ansett, founder of the Airline died, aged 72.
1982 Ansett introduced the Golden Wing Club.
1983 Ansett introduced the Boeing 767-200 with 211 seats.
1986 Ansett introduced the Boeing 737-300 with 110 seats.
1988 Ansett Introduced the Airbus A320-200 with 144 seats.
1990 The name of the airline became Ansett Australia several weeks before domestic airline deregulation started on October 31st.
1991 Ansett launched Australia's first Frequent Flyer program
1993 Ansett Australia's first international flights commenced on September 11th, to Bali.
1994 Ansett Australia's first of 3 Boeing 747-300s Spaceships began flying to Japan and Hong Kong.
1995 For the second year, Ansett Australia won the NTIA Airline of the Year and the Australian Federation of Travel Agents Best Airline awards.
1997 Ansett joined The Olympic Airlines Team Partnership to promote the Sydney Olympic Games and a co-branded Ansett/Westpac/Visa credit card was announced.
1998 Australian Competition and Consumer Commission gave approval for the Ansett group, Air New Zealand, and Singapore to form an alliance.
1999 Ansett replaced its Boeing 747-300s with two Boeing 747-400, and it became a full member of the Star Alliance.
2000 Air New Zealand moved to full ownership of Ansett on the 23rd June.
2002 On March 4th the Company was wound up and Administrators Mentha & Korda were appointed to finalise all matters.