Norse Atlantic CEO: We Are Not Norwegian Air. Let’s Move On

Norse Atlantic Airways CEO Bjørn Tore Larsen brushed off comparisons to Norwegian Air and is confident the US will approve the new airline in time for its planned transatlantic launch later this year or in the first quarter of next year. “We have nothing to do with [Norwegian Air’s] NAI,” Larsen said. “We don’t see any reason why our application should be rejected.” But the comparisons are striking, if not wholly accurate. Norse Atlantic plans to offer low-cost flights between Europe and the US, on a fleet of former Norwegian Air Boeing 787s it leased from AerCap. The new airline launches just as Norwegian Air, in bankruptcy, pulled back from long-haul flights to focus on flights in the Nordics and the rest of Europe. These similarities were enough to re-open some of the wounds left by the bruising fight to approve Norwegian Air International (NAI), Norwegian Air’s Irish subsidiary, a few years ago. Unions and competing carriers on both sides of the Atlantic claimed then that Norwegian Air based NAI in Ireland to avoid Norway’s stricter labor laws. It took years for the US Transportation Department to approve NAI’s foreign air carrier permit, an unusual delay for a European airline. And many of those same objectors are back. <br/>