The Star Alliance turns 19 tomorrow, Saturday the 14th of May. The network is now an “adult” with 27 member airlines carrying almost 638 million passengers annually. This compares to SkyTeam with 20 airlines and 588 million passengers annually and Oneworld with 15 airlines and almost 513 million.
Original 5: Scandinavian Airlines, Thai Airways International, Air Canada, Lufthansa, & United
Starting with just five airlines, the network has grown to include:
I have flown 159 times with nine Star Alliance members for a total of 424,788km (263,951 miles), almost ten times around the earth! This represents 14% of all my flights and a third of the distance I have ever flown! The Star Alliance carriers I have flown are:
- Air New Zealand which I rate 98% having flown them 44 times- my next flight is in three weeks
- Lufthansa I rate a high 96%
- Singapore Airlines gets a rating from me of 92%
Upstairs on Singapore’s 380
- Turkish is rated at 86% by me
- Thai scores 82%- I have two Thai flights booked in the second half of this year
- Air Canada 80%
- Swiss 80%
- United 68%
- SAS Scandinavian Airlines only gets a 60% rating from me
My Star Alliance route map! Current Star Alliance carriers only.
Flying to LHR on first day of United -Continental merger
I also flew 50 times with the now defunct Ansett who was Star Alliance’s only Australian member. I was on 27 US Airways flights before they switched to One World and then merged with American. Six of my Continental flights were during the three years they switched from Skyteam to Star, before the 2012 merger with United. One of my favourite Star Alliance members was BMI who technically merged into British Airways in 2012. When I flew TACA, the El Salvadorean airline, in the 1990s, there was no Star Alliance. TACA were involved in the alliance from 2012 until their restructure into Avianca in 2013.
Other airlines that have left the alliance include
- Spanair and Varig through bankruptcy
- Blue and Shanghai through mergers or restructures
- Mexicana (switched to One World and then collapsed)
- TAM (switched to One World and then merged with LAN)
By comparison I have flown six of Skyteam’s 20 airlines and 12 of 15 OneWorld’s members. OneWorld, however, is where I have flown half of my 2.5 million kilometres (1.5m miles) largely with Qantas, American, British and Cathay Pacific.
Which is your most travelled alliance? Is it the same as your favourite alliance? Do you have a favourite Star Alliance carrier?
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