Callsign	IRANAIR
Country	Iran
Website	http://www.iranair.com
Wikipedia	https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iran_Air

An Iran Air Boeing 707-320 at Frankfurt Airport in 1970An Iran Air Boeing 747SP at John F. Kennedy International Airport in 1976In 1965, Iran Air took delivery of its first jet aircraft, the Boeing 707 and six Boeing 727-100, followed by the Boeing 737-200 in 1971, three of the stretched Boeing 727-200 in 1974, and three variants of Boeing 747 (one 747-100B, two −200M and four SP), starting in 1978–1979. By the mid-1970s, Iran Air was serving cities in Europe with non-stop and one-stop flights, including over 30 flights a week to London alone.On 29 May 1971, the Tehran to New York City route was inaugurated, using Boeing 707s making a stop-over at London Heathrow Airport. Shortly thereafter, the route was upgraded to a non-stop flight using Boeing 747SPs, making Iran Air the second Middle Eastern carrier (after El Al), to offer non-stop service to New York. With this flight, Iran Air set a new world record in time and distance for a non-stop, scheduled long-haul flight (12 hours and 15 minutes, 9,867 km – 6,131 mi – 5,328 nm). In 1978, the airline acquired six Airbus A300 aircraft for use on its domestic trunk and busy regional routes. By the end of that year, Iran Air was serving 31 international destinations stretching from New York City to Peking and Tokyo. Plans were made to offer direct services to Los Angeles and to Sydney, for which the airline's long range Boeing 747SP aircraft were ideal. This would have allowed Iran Air to use Tehran as a midway point between East and West, because of its favorable geographical location. Such plans were never realized but they bear considerable resemblance to the hub-and-spoke strategies adopted by the ME3 carriers and Turkish Airlines. Lt. Gen. Ali-Mohammad Khademi was the general manager of Iran Air from 1962 to 1978. The Islamic Revolution[edit]As a result of economic sanctions against Iran, Iran Air was unable to expand or replace its fleet. The last time Iran Air was delivered brand-new Western aircraft prior to the 2016 lifting of nuclear-related sanctions was in 1994 when it received two Airbus A300-B4s in compensation for the downing of Iran Air Flight 655 by an American cruiser in 1988.In 2001, Iran Air purchased six second-hand Airbus A300s from Turkey, but only after two years, all six of them ended up grounded at airports in Tehran, Mashhad and Moscow. This caused significant controversy in Iran where officials cited GE engine design flaw and subsequent overheating as the reason for grounding the planes. One of these six planes was later confirmed to have returned to service by 2010. As a result of the close ties between Iran and Venezuela, Iran Air launched a route from Tehran to Caracas via Damascus in March 2007. The airline codeshared with Conviasa on the flight, and the passengers included Iranian tourists and Lebanese Venezuelans. The service was costly to operate. Iran Air utilised a Boeing 747SP, which consumed large amounts of fuel. In addition, the company had to restrict the number of passengers on the flight from Damascus to Caracas, as the high altitude and heat prevented the plane from taking off with a full cabin and fuel tanks. Ultimately, Iran Air lost over US$100,000 per flight. In October 2007, it handed the route over to Conviasa. Prior to the separation of Iran Air Tours from Iran Air in 2011, Russian-made Tupolev Tu-154s formed the backbone of the former's fleet. However, several successive disasters involving this plane ultimately led to a 2011 blanket ban on its operations within Iranian airlines, including Iran Air Tours. The Tu-154 fleet was gradually replaced with MD-83s over the course of a few months. According to Iran's Deputy Minister of Roads and Urban Development in 2014, Iran had more than 100 planes, some of them owned by Iran Air, grounded due to the lack of access to new parts and technical expertise during the sanctions era. The prolonged period of time that Iran Air was under international sanctions and barred from purchasing spare parts and new planes led to a dramatic rise in its average fleet age and plunging safety record. As of March 2017, Iran Air's average fleet age stands at 24.1 years, though this figure is set to improve through addition of new deliveries. Iran Air's subpar on-time performance, amongst those of most other Iranian airlines, has led to public anger and frustration, often inciting protests in the form of violent confrontations with the airline employees or airplane sit-ins for many hours after a severely-delayed flight has finally landed. Officials routinely attribute the delays to the economic sanctions, although at least one pro-revolutionary ideologue has cited "inefficiency and mismanagement" as the chief cause of this issue. EU ban and refueling issues[edit]An Iran Air Airbus A300B4-600R lands at London's Heathrow Airport in 2014. As of 2025, Iran Air is one of the last remaining commercial operators of the Airbus A300.On 5 July 2010, an aviation official of Iran accused the UK, Germany and the United Arab Emirates of refusing to refuel Iranian passenger jets. This move followed unilateral sanctions imposed by the US over the nuclear weapons dispute. Iran Air and Mahan Air both claimed to have been denied refuelling. A spokeswoman for Abu Dhabi Airports Company (ADAC) said that a contract was in place to refuel Iranian passenger flights and ADAC would continue to do so. A spokesperson for the United Kingdom Civil Aviation Authority said that it was the sole decision of independent suppliers if aircraft were to be refuelled or not. Germany's Transport Ministry said the refuelling of Iranian aircraft was not banned under EU or UN sanctions but did not say whether any independent refuellers were denying refuelling. Later in the day, Dubai Airport revealed that it continued to refuel Iranian passengers flights in and out of Dubai. The next day, a spokesperson for Iran said that no such limitation had been imposed.On 6 July 2010, it was announced that the European Commission would ban all of Iran Air's Airbus A320, Boeing 727 and Boeing 747 fleet from the EU over safety concerns. This move came as a major blow to Iran Air, limiting flights to Europe with its own aircraft. In 2012, the EU re-allowed the refuelling of Iran Air aircraft at secondary European airports such as Ljubljana and Budapest, in an effort to retain the refuelling contracts within the EU, rather than letting them go to Serbia or later Belarus and Ukraine. In January 2012, Iran Air's flights to and from London Heathrow operated with a fuel stop at Manston Airport in Kent. However, the airport announced in December 2011 that this arrangement was to end and it would no longer refuel the company's aircraft. This announcement swiftly followed the closure of Iran's embassy in London as the consequence of the ransacking of the British embassy in Tehran. The airport stressed that it had not breached any trade agreements, as it had no connections with the US. Lifting of sanctions and modernization plans[edit]

Iran Air orders after the JCPOA

Manufacturer	Aircraft type	Orders	Deliveries	Contract value(in billions)	List prices(in billions)
Airbus	A320-200	6	—	—	$0.606
	A320neo	32	—		$3.232
	A321-200	9	1		$0.946
	A330-200	9	2		$1.908
	A330-900	28	—		$8.299
	A350-1000	16	—		$5.864
	A380-800	12	—	—
Total		100	3	< $10.0	$20.856
Boeing	737 MAX 8	50	—	—	$5.620
	777-300ER	15	—		$5.207
	777-9	15	—		$6.132
Total		80	0	$8.0 to $9.5	$16.959
ATR	72-600	20	13	$0.536	$1.09
Total		200	16	$18.5 to $20.0	$38.334