Air Canada was formed on April 10, 1937 as Trans-Canada Airlines, which at the time was a subsidiary of Canadian National Railway. The airlines first flight was launched using a Lockheed 10A on September 1, 1937 carrying just two passengers and some mail from Vancouver, Canada to Seattle, Washington. In 1964 TCA had grown to become Canada's national airline, and that same year, Jean Chretien submitted a bill to the Canadian government to change the name from Trans-Canada to Air Canada. The first time the bill was submitted it failed, therefore keeping the name Trans-Canada. However, on the second attempt at submission of the bill, it successfully passed and on January 1, 1965 officially becoming Air Canada. Towards the later part of the 1970's Air Canada reformed to become a state-controlled company. However, in 1989 Air Canada was once again privatized with the Canadian government having no shares in Air Canada. In 1997 Air Canada along side of United, Lufthansa, SAS Scandinavian, Thai Airways, and Varig Brazil formed the worlds largest airline alliance, the Star Alliance. Just a year later on September 2, 1998, hard times struck Air Canada as the pilots formed the first every strike at the airline, which was later settled after shutting down the airline for several days. In 1999 the Canadian Government relaxed aviation rules within Canada, aimed to consolidate the industry within Canada. This effectively led to Air Canada acquiring Canadian Airlines, in January 200, which was Canada's second largest airline at the time. This turned Air Canada into the worlds 12th largest airline. 2001 brought many additions to Air Canada, the airline took their subsidiaries of AirBC, Air Nova, Air Ontario, and Canadian Regional and formed them into one regional airline which was then named Air Canada Jazz. Later that year, Air Canada took after some of its US counterparts with creating an airline within an airline. Tango was formed to become a no-frills service and lower fares between major cities. Just a year later in 2002 Air Canada created yet another airline within and airline, this time named Tango, it was formed to compete with up and growing West Jet Airlines. Zip was operated as a separate company with its own employees. Finally in 2002 another airline within an airline was created, Air Canada Jetz. Jetz was formed a charter division mainly focused on its charter services for professional teams. Bankruptcy came to Air Canada on April 1, 2003, just 19 months later Air Canada successfully re-organized to exit Bankruptcy protection on September 30, 2004. With this came a few changes, Air Canada Tango and Zip were dismantled and brought back into mainline Air Canada, However, the Tango name did not die, Air Canada now uses it for their lowest fare area of economy. In October of 2003, Air Canada became the first North American airline to launch non-stop service from North America to India. The flight flew from Toronto to Delhi. With the addition of the Airbus A340-500 Air Canada once again created a long distance non-stop flight. On August 1, 2004 Air Canada effectively changed its Toronto-Hong Kong service to being non-stop instead of stopping in Vancouver. In 2004, Air Canada launched a new marketing campaign and in-flight service with the help of Celine Dion, singing the new Air Canada theme song You and I. Just a short time later, Air Canada retired the 747-400 aircraft, the last flight arrived Toronto and ended 30 years of 747 service. The A350 took the role over for the aircraft, which will be short lived as Air Canada plans to replace the aircraft already with the Boeing 777-200LR and 787, with an official announcement on April 25, 2005, which on June 18, 2005 was cancelled due to rejection by Air Canada's Pilots. This made way for Air Canada to accelerate its refurbishment of the Boeing 767 aircraft which will now include new seat covering and in-flight entertainment systems. Plans also include winglets for the 767 to reduce fuel burn. On September 23, 2005 Air Canada's order for 18 777's and 15 787's with options for 18 more 777's and 46 more 787's was renewed with Boeing after issues of pay and other costs were settled with the pilots. The order for 777's which will begin delivery in 2007 will allow Air Canada to phase out the A340 series aircraft, including the A340-500 which is relatively new along side of the 767 series. The contract was officially signed on November 9, 2005. Also in 2005 Air Canada followed the trend of many US carries in ending hot meals in coach on North American flights and selling cold meals on-board.

In-Flight Services-

Buy On Board meals in North America in Economy (Tango) class. On most Air Canada Aircraft there are monitors every few rows that show select programming The Airbus A340-500 features Personal TV's in every seat Coming soon: Personal TV's in every seat on the entire fleet, business class seats will change to lie-flat seats.

Frequent Flyer Program Airline Partners/Code Sharing Partners -

Adria Airways, Air Canada Jazz, Air Creebec, Air New Zealand, Air One, ANA, Asiana Airlines, Austrian Airlines, Austrian Arrows, Bearskin Airlines, Blue 1, bmi, Calm Air, Canadian North, Croatia Airlines, First Air, Keewatin Air, Lauda Air, LOT Polish Airlines, Lufthansa, Mexicana, SAS Scandanavian Airlines, Singapore Airlines, Spanair, TAP Air Portugal, Thai Airways, United Airlines, US Airways, and Varig Brazil.

Air Canada Fleet (Current)-

48 Airbus A319's

52 Airbus A320's

10 Airbus A321's

8 Airbus A330-300's

10 Airbus A340-300's

2 Airbus A340-500's

12 Boeing 767-200's

33 Boeing 767-300's

19 CRJ-100's

31 CRJ-200's

15 CRJ-700's

39 De Havilland Dash 8-100's

23 De Havilland Dash 8-300's

13 Embraer 175's

1 Embraer 190

Current On-Order-

18 Boeing 777's (18 Options)

14 Boeing 787's (46 Options)

2 Embraer 175's ( 2 Options)

44 Embaer 190's

Historical Fleet -

Boeing 727-200, 737-200, 747-100/200/400/400 Combi

Bristol 31

BAe 146-200

Canadair North Star

Douglas DC-3, DC-8-40/50/60/70, DC-9-30, DC-10

Fokker F28

Lancastrian

Lockheed Electra, L-1011-1/5/100/500, Electra/Super Electra, Lodestar, Super Constellation

Stearman

Vickers Vanguard, Viscount