hello
i dont have a wide knowledge of the pan am history but ive heard alot of great things about it.
like its was a great airline of the time had flights almost everywhere.
so how come its came to a drastic end, what went wrong?

Dan

A tragic terrorist attack killed over 250 passengers in a Pan-Am 747 . I think it was in the late eighties, or early nineties? That really got people scared of flying Pan-Am. This wasnt the only cause for the airlines end though, but I am not too sure about the other reasons

edit: looked it up, happened 21. December, 1988

The Lockerbie bombing
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am_Flight_103

After the Lockerbie bombing, the airline finally fell apart. Many travelers avoided booking on Pan Am as they had begun to associate the airline with danger
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am#Downturn

oh sorry i didnt link to 2 together, why do you think pan am went down after lockerbie, but united and american are still doing well after 9/11?

Dan

from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pan_Am#Downturn

It has been said that if it wasn't for that lawsuit then Pan Am might have still been around today. At that time Airlines didnt have insurance against lawsuits that big. These days most Airlines have Insurance to protect them against lawsuits that big which might answer one reason why AA and United are still round.

Pan Am was a great Airline! I still remember the flights I had with them and still have some of their souvenirs.
I found a chronicle about Pan Am written in german though , so I guess I'll have to translate it:

The airline was created by Juan Trippe in the year 1927. It had received an order of the American government for a regular air mail traffic between the Keys and Havana (Cuba). First pax flights took place starting from the year 1928 on the same distance.
First long distance routes starting from the year 1931 from Miami for Buenos Aires. The airplane, used for this purpose, was a Sikorsky S-40. Rapidly further distances followed. As the first airline PanAm offered transpacific-flights starting from 1935, with a Martin M130 from San Francisco to Manila (Philippine). The flight costed 600$/person (as much as a car those days) and took five days.
Starting from 1939 PanAm offered a route over the North Atlantic, from New York to Lisbon and continuing to Marseille. World war II breaking out shortly thereafter let the PanAm grow further, since she could take over orders for military transportation. In addition military pilots were trained.
After the war the PanAm was one of three airlines that flew over the Atlantic. Besides PanAm only Trans World Airlines and the American Overseas airlines offered these routes. Last one mentioned being taken over 1950 by PanAm. The lucrative market was divided for the advantage of the Pan American World Airways. The company was proud to have the first global flight route network.
In 1955 PanAm then landed the so-called jet-coup in that it ordered 20 Boeing 707 and 25 Douglas DC-8 of the "drawing board". On the 26 October 1958 PanAm introduced the new jet technology on its routes over the Atlantic. Machines of the types Boeing 707 flew the route from New York to Paris in only 8.5 hours flight time. The passenger volume then grew very quickly on this route and all other airlines were forced to do likewise and to also use jet airplanes.
PanAm grew further and so ordered 25 novel Boeing 747, the so-called jumbo jet, in 1967 as the first airline. A newer version, the type Boeing 747SP was used 1976, in addition to fly with only two stopovers around the world. Such a Round the world Trip lasted 46 hours and costed 1000$.
From 1980 on the company got into economic needs when it concluded, also to serve national routes. This was rejected of the US regulating authority, and one so PanAm bought the overselled Nationally Airline. In order to soften the financial problems, a large part of the real estate and the shares in other firms were sold. This also included the headquarters, 1964 built PanAm Building (design Walter Gropius) in the park Avenue in midtown manhattan, New York. The life insurance company MetLife bought the high-rise. Five years later the company management decided a further sale. 1985 the rights on the Pacific routes, including the airplanes used, were sold to United Airlines. The decisions proved to be a huge strategic mistake.
On 23 December 1984 Pan took one revolutionary step in that it used the two engine powered Airbus A300/A310 in a non-stop-transatlantic-flight from Hamburg to New York as the first airline. Based on only having two engines, Pan was forced to fly a detour along the coasts in the first years. Because there was no major incident and it proved the Airbus to be very dependable, PanAm later got the permission to fly the shorter direct route. With regard to its reliability, that was the breakthrough for Airbus in the intercontinental flight.
Yet it was not the economic reorientation that made PanAm bankrupt, but rather a bombing. On the 21 December 1988, terrorists burst a Boeing 747 in the skys above the Scottish Lockerbie. All 259 passengers died, eleven persons at the ground were killed when a wing filled with kerosene exploded on its impact in a residential area. However the misfortune as such did not lead to the economic end, but rather the fact that PanAm - previously a sort of American status symbol - was now looked at to be a possible goal for terrorists. The passengers didn't regard it as safe anymore and passenger numbers went back drastically.
In 1991 this traditional business stopped when Delta Air Lines bought the bankrupt comany - originally with the goal, to rehabilitate PanAm. Shortly before the acceptance, Delta had already bought the Transatlantic-routes with Frankfurt as a hub and a national american Shuttle-service for a billion U.S. dollar. At this time Delta expanded its weekly number of flights to Frankfurt/main from 21 to 83 and became therewith the second largest bidder of North Atlantic flights from Frankfurt.
The breakdown of the company shrunk to a small remainder and therefor resulted in its end, after Delta Air Lines left as a financier and partner. United Airlines then bought the Latin American routes together with the take off/landing rights in New York, Washington D.C. and Chicago for all together 135 million dollars.
PanAm was the first customer of airplane types such as Boeing 314 "Clipper", Boeing 377, Boeing 707, Boeing 747 and Boeing 747SP.
PanAm had Product Placement in numerous films with airplanes, personnel or advertising banners ( also like its competitor TWA, no longer existing today).

Wow, thats it [img]http://www.cheesebuerger.de/images/smilie/muede/c030.gif[/img] . I hope I could help you as it aslo was an interesting story for me.

edit: And why did it take me that long to notice Outlaw nz's great link? [img]http://www.cheesebuerger.de/images/smilie/boese/a050.gif[/img]

From what ive heard from people on here and airlines.net it seemd a great airlines, shame it had such a bad ending.

thanks for all the info everyone

Dan

Here's some info on Pan Am:

Pan Am Info

Pan Am VA

Also, both my parents used to fly for PAA. My dad's last flight was the day before PAA went out of buisness.

Thanks Chill for all of the work you did! Good reading...

well according to wikipedia and some other websites (not saying this is true, but only what i've read) Pan Am is now in operation again. Pan Am III is using 727 jets and some reigonal planes to fly to carrib. islands from the east coast. Last I heard they were still in operation, but this could have changed recently.

From what I've gathered, it has nothing to do with the old Pan Am though

Yup, you are right with that.
In 1998 an airline was founded, carrying the name and the Logo of PanAm. Even the airplanes were held in the well known PanAm design. Owner is Guilford Transportation/PanAm Systems in New Hampshire. However this new PanAm doesn't have anything to do with the historical PanAm. The new PanAm is only flying routes in north-america. Logo and name are registered trademarks to the airline situated in New Hampshire, USA. Guilford Transportation was founded in 1977 and started off with railway transportation. In 1998 they bought the rights for the Pan Am Logo and in 2006 the company was renamed from Guilford Transportation Industries to PanAm Systems and its railway system into PanAm Railways.

Just seems like we weren't the only ones missing PanAm being around

By the way thanks Bernoulli, I had fun doing it although Outlaw nz links were right on target, just didn't notice them. I think PanAm was even the first airline I ever flew with. Maybe that explains my enthusiasm

correction on what I mentioned earlier, it is called Pan Am Clipper Connection, with same logos and callsign.

I have hated Pan Am because of what it did to howard hughes. Howard hughes owned TWA, and Pan Am screwed him over. Those who treat one a certain way will always recieve that treatment in the future

Wow...dude...you hate Pan Am because of what they did to Howard Hughes? You hate...an airline...because of what the owners did to Howard Hughes. That's like hating Baltimore, Maryland just because the Ravens suck. I don't see what one has to do with the other...but...y'know...whatever. It's not like the actual airline attacked Hughes. I mean...seriously...I can hear the police report now:
"So what you are saying, Mr Hughes...if you could stop washing your hands for a moment...is that an entire airline...kicked your butt?"

Seriously, this reminds me of "The Aviator". It's Hollywood and not always close to reality, but still a nice movie.
Juan Trippe did give Hughes a hard time, and trying to include politics wasn't nice but what else would you expect of a market leader? It's competition. I'd blame the politic system for getting involved and not the airline. In the end nothing really happened to TWA anyways. At least not until december 2001.

They simply purchased the brand to get recognition.


More on this historic airline here- http://www.panam.org

Pan American World Airways was as arrogant and filled with as many A-holes as American Airlines is today, back in those days it was TWA and Pan Am and everyone else was just a national carrier, and during that time TWA had an advantage over PA because of their domestic routes which fed their international routes and PA was "the chosen instrument" and the "Flagged carrier" of the USA which enticed many travelers but still had to rely primarily on the O and D markets of JFK, ORD, LAX, and MIA. Which is some of the reasons why they both hated each other, they both had what the other wanted, Pan Am wanted the domestic routes and TWA wanted the international routes and if you had the kind of power they had you would try everything in your power to get what you want, in the end they both got what they wanted, and they both went downhill Pan Am didnt quite know how to handle this new domestic route structure so they bought National, and the rest is history, and the holding company for TWA thought it would be a good idea to spin off Trans World Airlines after which they were taken over by Carl Ichan and sucked dry which led to 3 trips to CH.11 and finally taken over by AA. A little different prospective but i dont think Pan American was glamourous and great as everyone now a days say they were. Ambassador class was just as good as
clipper class...