Since 1985: The story of Emirates Airlines started with flights to Karachi, Mumbai

Since 1985: The story of Emirates Airlines started with flights to Karachi, Mumbai

UAE will celebrate its 50th National Day this year. As the country heads towards this significant milestone, it is worthwhile to trace Dubai's journey from a sleepy fishing village to the global aviation hub it has become today. Any story about Dubai is incomplete without a mention of Emirates airline – one of the region's largest airlines. In 1984, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, then UAE Minister of Defence asked Sir Maurice Flanagan, then managing director of dnata, to look into starting an airline. By December that year, a comprehensive business plan was ready, and the name "Emirates" was chosen for the new airline. A year later, Flanagan was tasked with the ambitious mission to launch an airline in 5 months with $10 million seed funding. There would be no subsidies or aero political protection under Dubai's open skies policy. On October 25, 1985, Emirates operated its first flights from Dubai to Karachi and Mumbai, using a Boeing 737 and an Airbus 300 B4 wet-leased from Pakistan International Airlines. In its first five years of operations, Emirates grew its network to 14 destinations – these included Mumbai, Delhi, Karachi, Amman, Colombo, Cairo, Dhaka, Male, Frankfurt, Istanbul, Damascus,