The Observer
Low-cost flights to the US could become a reality when an airline promising cheap tickets on transatlantic routes is launched in Britain early next year.
Ottawa-based Zoom Airlines, which currently offers one-way fares between the UK and Canada for as little as £99, is to launch Zoom UK after Bank of Scotland Growth Equity bought a 7.5 per cent stake. Zoom says it will fly between the UK and the US, Mexico and the Caribbean. Likely routes include Gatwick to New York and San Francisco.
A spokesman said they would be the first dedicated low-cost flights to the US since Freddie Laker launched Laker Skytrain in 1977. The London to New York service was popular but went bust in 1982 as other airlines lowered their fares in response.
The UK subsidiary will be formed later this year using the Bank of Scotland's £5.7m investment and could start flying in early 2007.
Zoom was started by Scots-born travel entrepreneurs John and Hugh Boyle, who made £53m with the sale of Direct Holidays in 1998. In the last three years it has carried 750,000 passengers between the UK and Canada. It has five Boeing 767-300s and two more planes on order.
Like the Canada routes, ticket prices with Zoom UK will include meals and there will be a premium-class cabin. Passengers will be able to fly to one destination and back from another - for example, from Gatwick to New York and returning from San Francisco - at no extra cost.
Ryanair and Easyjet have ruled out transatlantic flights, instead concentrating on new short-haul destinations.
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