The End of Yerex’s Airline

TACA adopted a new livery in 2008. The airline will be finally merged into AVIANCA in 2013.

SAN SALVADOR, El Salvador. — After eighty two years in service in just a couple of months (possibly by the end of May), TACA Airlines (once TACA Airways, TACA International Airlines and GRUPO TACA) will dissapear into the entrails of Colombian flag carrier AVIANCA. In 2009 both airlines created the AviancaTACA Holding Company. For several months airline experts believed the airline would have operated as Air France/KLM, mantaining their individual images, logos, liveries and hubs. But in 2012 the company’s CEO Fabio Villegas informed the TACA branding was being dropped and that the marketing sole name was going to be AVIANCA. It is also expected the end of the use of IATA codes like “TA”, “LR” and “GU” for simply “AV”. TACA was founded in 1931 in Honduras by the New Zealander Lowell Yerex. He later sold the airline to TWA, the latter sold it to Waterman Steamship Company of New Orleans and finally in the 1950s the airline was bought by the Salvadorean Kriete family. Indeed 2013 is the end of an era, Yerex once great airline.