ASL Airlines Ireland Limited, formerly Air Contractors, is a freight and passenger airline. It operates scheduled freight services throughout Europe on behalf of major integrators such as FedEx Feeder and DHL Express; and operates unscheduled passenger air charter flights, as well as some wet lease services for scheduled airlines. ASL Airline Holdings Limited, the parent company of ASL Airlines Ireland, has its head office at 3 Malahide Road, Swords, County Dublin, Ireland.
The holding company has its origins in Air Bridge Carriers in the United Kingdom which was formed in 1972 to fly fresh produce from the Channel Islands. This was quickly supplemented by ad-hoc charter work, with special emphasis on "awkward loads" such as aircraft engines and heavy machinery for the developing North Sea oil fields. At the beginning of the 1980s the overnight express parcels business was in its infancy within Europe and Air Bridge was ideally placed to take advantage. TNT, FedEx, DHL and UPS were all nightly customers.
The company was subsequently acquired by the Hunting Group, which decided in 1992 to rebrand all of its subsidiaries and Air Bridge changed to Hunting Cargo Airlines, with a new corporate image. All of the airline's operations were transferred to Ireland in 1997.
In 1997 the Hunting Group decided to sell off all its aviation related companies. In June 1998 it was announced that the airline had been sold to a consortium consisting of Compagnie Maritime Belge NV from Belgium and Safair (Pty) Ltd from South Africa (part of the Imperial Group). This prompted a change of name to Air Contractors (ACL). Following the restructuring of the services with DHL and the end of the operation of the Boeing 727s, ACL expanded its turbo-prop operations and started a major upgrade of the fleet with the modern and fuel efficient ATR family.
In 2007, Imperial disposed of all its aviation-related businesses. At the same time an interest was acquired in Europe Airpost and its fleet of Boeing 737 Classic aircraft operating a combination of postal and passenger activities. This prompted the decision to rename the holding company ASL Aviation Group to co-ordinate the different operating companies under a new identity. As a result ACL was branded ASL Airlines Ireland.
Livery
ATR 72-202(F), registration EI-SLU, built 1993, serial number 364 Cointrin (GVA), Geneva, Switzerland, 2 July 2017
