Canada 3000 Airlines Inc. was a Canadian discount charter airline offering domestic and international flights. It was the largest charter airline in the world at the time of its operation, with over 90 destinations worldwide, although it changed to scheduled service in 2000 after the Canadian Airlines and Air Canada merger. Canada 3000 competed with Air Canada, WestJet, and fellow charter airline Air Transat. In November 2001, the airline went out of business after a sharp decline in revenues following the September 11 attacks in the United States. There have been several attempts to restart the airline since then. The airline was headquartered in Etobicoke in the west-end of Toronto, Ontario. History Operations The airline was created in 1988 by British airline Air 2000, initially for charter service to lease some of its airplanes for Canadian charter travel. The airline was denied license to operate by the National Transport Agency NTA because of the control and ownership of the UK firm. Air 2000 dropped out of an ownership position, and the airline started operations in December 1988. On May 1, 1989, by order of the NTA, it changed its name to Canada 3000. The next year the airline acquired Vacationair and a subsidiary was created in Mexico with the name Aerofiesta (not to be confused with the similarly named Aero Fiesta Mexicana, which was founded in 1993). The company's owners were the Deluce family (25%), chairman John Lecky (45%) and Adventure Tours (30%). Following the demise of Wardair, the company's goal was to become Canada's largest charter carrier, a position it attained in 1991. The cover of the Canada 3000 summer of 1997 flight schedule stated the airline was serving destinations in Belgium, Denmark, England, Fiji, France, Germany, Iceland, the Netherlands, Portugal, Scotland and the U.S. as well as Canada. In 1998, co-founder and CEO Angus Kinnear was the recipient of the Tony Jannus Award for his contributions to commercial air transportation. As of 1998, the airline carried over 2.5 million passengers annually, and had destinations in 22 countries. In April 1998, Canada 3000 became the launch customer and first commercial operator of the Airbus A330-200. In 1999, Canada 3000 purchased Holiday Travel Consultants based out of Vancouver from Richard and Shelley Carlin, which expanded to become Canada 3000's retail division under the name Canada 3000 Tickets. By the time it closed its doors, Canada 3000 had expanded its retail