Ain Al-Yaqueen 17 October, 2004 The aviation sector began initial activities in 1934 when the late King Abdul Aziz issued a Royal Order to establish a Commission for Aviation Affairs under the Chairmanship of Prince Faisal Ibn Abdul Aziz.

Two years later, eight young Saudis were dispatched to Italy for a two-year training assignment. On completion of the assignment, they returned to the Kingdom as pilots and engineers.

The late King Abdul Aziz was given a DC-3 Dakota plane by U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt on 27 May 1945. He granted permission for the plane to operate between Riyadh and Jeddah transporting citizens.

The Kingdom was concerned rapidly to promote aviation. It therefore issued an order facilitating the purchase of more Dakota planes for domestic and international flights. This marked the birth of Saudi Arabian Airlines (SAA).

As a result of the generous support of the Kingdom's leadership, including an order issued by Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Fahd Ibn Abdul Aziz for the purchase of 61 high-tech, advanced planes such as Boeing and McDonnell Douglas, the fleet of SAA currently includes 139 of the most modern aircraft.

This has enabled SAA to transport more than 13.5 million passengers annually, on 300 daily flights to 52 foreign and 25 regional destinations.

The SAA currently has over 24,000 employees, 1,000 pilots, and thousands of engineers.

Civil aviation has grown in parallel with the Kingdom's ambitious development plans. Its advantage over road and rail in terms of speed for users has made it the transportation mode of choice and its contribution to the Kingdom's successful progress cannot be over-estimated.

Saudi Arabian Airlines has played a vital role in the development of the country. Well before the Kingdom's road network was built, Saudi Arabian Airlines made possible access to the most remote areas of the country, providing a network of transport and communication that was essential for the development of commerce and industry, education, health care and other urban amenities.

Internationally, Saudi Arabian Airlines has also played an important role in the Kingdom's development. Within two years of its founding, Saudi Arabian Airlines began operations outside the Kingdom. Within the space of a little more than a decade, it became the region's largest airline. Today, with over 12 million passengers carried each year and an international network linking 50 cities on four continents, Saudi Arabian Airlines is one of the world's major airlines and ranks 15th among the 165 member airlines of the International Air Transport Association (IATA).

Director General Saudi Arabian Airlines Dr. Khaled A. Ibn Bakr said on the occasion of the National Day that the march is full of achievements and rich in experience

A very defined picture of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia was created when the late founder King Abdul Aziz rose to unify the far flung areas of his country, lay the foundation stone of a well established and strong nation, and restore the rule of law based on Islamic jurisprudence and the traditions of Prophet Mohammad (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him), regardless of the limited resources available at that time

Saudi Arabian Airlines (SV) is an exquisite reward of the noble efforts of the founder of the Kingdom and his successors. It is illustrative of the success of our country, and is a true pulse of the progress of this blessed land. It is a national organization that plays a prominent role in the economic development of our beloved Kingdom.
 
SV has responded well to the challenges of the new century. It has dealt with the dynamics of the new economic world order by investing in the training of its employees, and by acquiring cutting edge technologies and developing state-of-the-art systems.

Throughout the years, Saudi Airlines has strived to maintain high performance standards in all aspects of its operation. A major industry criteria that airlines compete to increase, it is the on-time performance index. During the last decade Saudi Airlines' on-time performance (From 1993 to 2002) shows that a total of 809,626 flights have been successfully operated with an average on time departure of 90%.

Saudi Arabian Airlines recently augmented its fleet with the acquisition of 61 state-of-the-art Boeing 747-400s, 777-200s, MD-11s and MD-90s. These 61 aircraft have already been received and introduced into service thus making the Airline's fleet among the youngest in the world.

Saudi Arabian Airlines started out in 1945 with a single twin-engined DC-3(Dakota) HZ-AAX given to King Abdul Aziz as a gift by the then U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt. This was followed months later with the purchase of two more DC-3s, and these formed the nucleus of what in later years was to become one of the world's largest airlines.

Today Saudi Arabian Airlines has some one hundred and thirty-nine (139) aircraft, including the latest and most advanced wide-bodied jets presently available: B747-400s, B747-300s, B747-100s, B777-200s, Airbus A300-600s, MD-11s and MD90s.