Last week, Turkish Airlines, the flag carrier airline of turkey, was awarded the "Best Airline in Europe", "Best Premium Economy Seats" and "Best Airline in Southern Europe" at the World Airline Awards. At the same time, the airline acquired the 3rd place in the best airline companies in all Europe countries. The awards were given to the Turkish Airlines after a survey of 10 months that included the views of 18.8 million airline customers from over 100 different nationalities. Earlier, the Airlines had already made a distinction by winning the "Skytrax World Aviation Award 2009". The Award is considered as the Oscar of Aviation industry.
Turkish Airlines was established on May 20, 1933. It was then State Airlines Administration, and was part of the Ministry of Defense. The fleet was very much limited and included only a five-seat Curtiss Kingbird, two four-seat Junkers F-13s and one ten-seat Tupolev ANT-9. Passing through every thick and thin the Airlines now is headquartered in Turkish Airlines General Management Building on the grounds of Ataturk Airport in Istanbul as one of the best airlines in the world. Actually it is the 9th best Airline in the world.
It has services for 139 international and 42 domestic cities. There are 181 airports that have Turkish Airlines landing on and taking off from them. The airline was able to generate revenues of US $2.23, US $3.0, US $4.5, US $4 and US $5.6 billion for the years of 2006, 2007, 2008, 2009 and 2010 respectively. It has more than 15,000 employees with the number even increasing with each passing year. It has plans for further expansion, and is currently in talks with JAT of Serbia in order to form a new company instead of JAT Airways that is suffering from debts. The airline has been able to develop a dominating technical services operation that has not just been maintaining its own aircraft but those of third parties as well. Turkish Technic, the technical department, has about 5000 thousand technical staff employed. Further, the airline has several flight simulators and offer flight training services.
Turkish Airline, after being privatized to a considerable extent is now owned 49.12% by the Turkey's Prime Ministry Privatization Administration and 50.88% publicly through publicly traded shares. The Airline's current fleet includes about 168 passenger and 6 cargo aircraft with an average age of 6.8 years. The passenger aircrafts include about 85 Airbuses and about 83 Boeing aircrafts that keep on providing services to million of people belonging to different parts of world.
Turkish Airlines has decided to start its services in Afghanistan, as well. With the first flight scheduled for July 10, 2011. Definitely, the airline is going to continue it best services in the country and would facilitate the people who fly from and to the country. This can also prove to be a step to bring Turkey and Afghanistan further close to each other. Turkey has been considered as the hub for various trades that are carried out among southern European countries, Asia and Middle East. The frequent interactions with Turkey can help Afghanistan to a great extent and guarantee the opportunity of learning from each other considerably. In short, the addition of Turkish Airlines in the list of companies providing air travel services in the country is a remarkable and very important one.