Intra Airways Ltd was formed on 1 January 1969 by former British United Airways employees to operate passenger and cargo charters from the Channel Islands to the UK and the Continent with a single Douglas DC-3. At the time of its inception, Intra Airways also applied to the Air Transport Licensing Board for a licence to commence scheduled services between Jersey and Guernsey. Intra Holdings Ltd of Jersey was the newly formed airline's majority shareholder. It held 90% of Intra Airways's stock. To support its fledgling operation, Intra Airways set up an associated engineering company based at Exeter Airport. The ATLB granted Intra Airways its first licence to operate scheduled services at the beginning of 1971. That licence was for the Jersey—Staverton route. It resulted in the acquisition of a second DC-3. In 1974, the Civil Aviation Authority, the ATLB's successor, approved Intra Airways's application for a scheduled service licence to operate 30 weekly flights between Shoreham Airport and Jersey and/or Guernsey, with an extension to Gatwick. However, the CAA's licence was for passenger services only. Intra Airways planned to serve these routes with Islanders. The new services were intended to replace the Shoreham — Channel Islands services previously operated by JF Airlines, while the extension to Gatwick was meant to connect with Intra Airways's Gatwick—Deauville service. By 1978, Intra Airways operated scheduled passenger services linking Jersey with Cambridge and Gloucester/Cheltenham in the UK as well as Caen, Deauville, Dinard, St Brieuc and Nantes in France, Ostend and Brussels in Belgium, and Düsseldorf in West Germany. In addition, it operated scheduled all-cargo services between Jersey and Guernsey as well as between the Channel Islands and Bournemouth. The inter-Channel Islands cargo flights linked up with the domestic and international passenger service network. In addition to expanding its scheduled operations, Intra Airways continued operating both ad hoc and regular series of charter flights until the end of its existence in the late 1970s. The latter included regular cargo flights carrying newspapers from Luton to Belfast Aldergrove operated with DC-3s at night and summer inclusive tour passenger charters from Gatwick to Dublin using Viscounts during daytime. In January 1979 Intra Holdings Ltd sold its holding in Intra Airways. This resulted in the airline's merger with Bournemouth-based Express Air Freight Ltd. The new entity resulting from this merger was named Jersey European Airways . It was absorbed into East Midlands-based ABC, an all-cargo airline that was part of the Field Aviation/Hunting group of companies.
Fleet details
Intra Airways operated the following aircraft types:
