TAP Air Portugal airlines were founded on 14 March 1945, and it commenced operations on 19 September 1946. It is currently a state-owned flag carrier airline of Portugal, headquartered in Lisbon, serving as its hub. The secondary hub of the airline is Porto Airport. It has been a member of the Star Alliance since 2005 and operates on an average of 2500 flights a week to 90 destinations. The airline company has a fleet of 100 aircraft, and Airbus manufactures these aircraft. ATR and Embraer manufacture the 22 Aircraft. They operate on behalf of the regional airline TAP express.

This airline was also privatized for the first time in history in 1953. The airline bought its first Boeing-built jetliner in 1965, and in 1967, the airline became the first in Europe to operate jets exclusively. The airline also underwent a modernization program and changed its name to TAP Air Portugal. The airline also operated a fleet of 32 modern airliners by the end of the decade, and it served more than 40 destinations on around four continents. The fleet of the Boeing 707s and 747s was also replaced with a Lockheed L-1011 Tristars during the 1980s on long-haul routes. TAP also started operating its first Boeing 737-200s on short-haul routes by the late 1983s. TAP sold its Boeing 727s and 737s by the late 1990s and replaced them with Airbus A319, A320 and A321.

The Portuguese government also unveiled plans to reprivatize the airline and the US. Department of Transportation also announced the historic enforcement actions against six airlines.

History

The Airline Company operated under the jurisdiction of the Portuguese Civil Aviation office in 1945, and later the same year, it also took the delivery of its first aircraft which is a pair of Douglas DC-3s. The aircraft started operating an inaugural flight from Lisbon to Madrid in September 1946, and it carried a total of 11 passengers on one of its DC-3s. TAP Air Portugal also began a twelve-stop colonial service including Angola, Lourenco, Luanda, Mozambique and Marques. It also covered 24.450km within 15 days. This made it the longest air service operated with twin-engine airliners. To suit the tropical conditions at most of these destinations, a very special kind of uniform was adopted, comprising khaki shirts with shorts or skirts.

The airline also launched its first domestic services in 1947 and commenced a route between Lisbon and Porto and another international route between Sao Tome and London. New services to Paris and Seville were also launched in 1948.

Privatization

The airline was also privatized for the first time in 1953 from a public service to a public limited company. It also commenced new services to Tangier and Casablanca in the same year. Several Lockheed Super Constellations were acquired in late 1955 and were immediately introduced on the TAP African scheduled services to Luanda. During 1955, the airline company broke new ground with a long-distance experimental Transatlantic trip to Rio de Janeiro.

The firm had attained several milestones by the end of the decade, including a carriage of 64,000 passengers, fleet performing 10,000 hours of flight and a route network spanning 14,000 km.

The jet era

TAP entered the jet era and procured the initial batch of 3 French-built Sud Aviation Caravelle during July 1962. On 19 June 1964, one millionth passenger was carried by this airline broadly 18 years following the commencement of operations.

The airline achieved a milestone and it became the very first European airline to fly exclusively with jets in 1967. The service to New York City via Santa Maria Island began in 1969. Boston was also added to the New York service two years later.

TAP introduced a new computerized system handling reservations in 1974.