Zip – Some fun during a turbulent time
After all the uncertainty and controversy in the Canadian airline industry in the 1990’s, we began to see some resolutions in the early 2000’s. However, few people were pleased with the emerging outcome and there was little relief for those of us whose main interest was just to remain employed.
With the merger of Air Canada and Canadian Airlines, new and formidable competition came in the form of WestJet in Western Canada.
Air Canada’s response to WestJet was to form a similar ‘no-frills’ airline called 'Zip'.
I thought that this was a fantastic idea because, at long last, there was something fun happening. The bright neon paint jobs in blue, fuchsia (just a fun word to say), green and orange were, to me anyway, very amusing. Just seeing one of these aircraft taxi by made me smile.
The airline was formed in September 2002 and ceased operation only two years later in 2004; much too short a time. Air Canada also introduced Tango around the same time and is currently having great success with its Rouge subsidiary, but ‘Zip” could bring a chuckle to a passenger by just boarding the aircraft.
I came across the video below on the JustPlanes YouTube channel just recently. It was posted on March 15, 2019 and I can’t help but wonder where it has been for the past 17 years.
Air Canada allowed the JustPlanes crew to film C-GCPP (painted in beautiful fuchsia) during an hour flight around Vancouver.
Additional references:
Zip Fleet at Planespotter.net
Zip at Wikipedia
Canada Newswire press release at Airliners.net forum.
