Condor will continue to take to the skies after the German state shielded the airline from the demise of its parent company Thomas Cook with a €380m bridging loan.
The sum, provided by the federal government and the state of Hesse where the firm is based, must first be approved by the European commission’s competition watchdog.
Condor’s chief executive, Ralf Teckentrup, said the intervention on Tuesday was justified because the airline had a strong track record of profitability.
“[This] is an operationally healthy and profitable company, which will also record a positive result in the current fiscal year,” he said. “Because our liquidity for the seasonally weaker booking period was used up by our insolvent parent company, we needed this bridge financing to get us through the winter.”
Founded in 1955, the Frankfurt-based carrier holds a nostalgic value for many older Germans who associate its name with the newfound freedom of the postwar boom years.
Der Spiegel magazine this week described the carrier as “part of the inventory of the old federal republic, like the Volkswagen Beetle”.
Condor, which was gradually sold by Lufthansa to Thomas Cook in 2000-09, operates a larger fleet thanThomas Cook, with 58 planes in operation.
The bailout has been criticised by the pro-business Free Democratic party and the German taxpayers’ association, which argued most of Condor’s passengers were insured through their travel agency and would not have been left in the lurch.
