PAN AM

Some Crisis Are too big to recover

from Dharmender Prakash
Roll No. 23
Transnational Marketing
SRCC GBO
dharmenderprakash@yahoo
.com
A Brief Account of Pan Am
Pan American World Airways, commonly known asPan Am, was
the principal and largest internationalair carrierin the United States
from 1927 until its collapse on December 4, 1991.

Founded in 1927 as a scheduled air mail and passenger service

operating betweenKey West, Florida, andHavana, Cuba.

The airline became a major company credited with many

innovations that shaped the international airline industry, including
the widespread use ofjet aircraft,jumbo jets.

Identified by its blue globe logo, and the white pilot uniform caps,
the airline was a cultural icon of the 20th century.

. During most of the jet era, Pan Am's flagship terminal was
theWorldportlocated atJohn F. Kennedy Airportin New York
First Computerized reservation : Pan Am commissionedIBM to
build PANAMAC, a large computer that booked airline and hotel
reservations, which was installed in 1964.

The airline also builtWorldport, a terminal building at John F.

Kennedy Airport in New York which was distinguished by its
elliptical, four-acre (16,000m) roof.

Pan Am at its peak :

At its peak in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Pan Am advertised
under the slogan, the "World's Most Experienced Airline.

It carried 6.7million passengers in 1966, and by 1968, its 150 jets

flew to 86 countries on every continent except forAntarctica.

During that period, the airline was profitable and its cash reserves
totaled $1billion.

Pan Am also owned theInterContinental Hotel chain .

 Downfall Of Pan Am

A Public relations failure

Some Accidents,Incidents and
Reputational set backs :
On September 6, 1970, two menhijackedPan Amflight 93,
aBoeing 747 en route fromAmsterdam to New York.

On December 17, 1973 fivePalestinianterrorists bombedPan Am

flight 110while passengers boarded , killing 30 people.

On July 9, 1982Clipper Defiance, aBoeing 727 crashed minutes

after takeoff fromNew Orleans Airportin the worst accident in
aviation history. All 145 passengers and crew members perished, as
well as eight people on the ground .

On August 11, 1982Pan Am flight 830, was bombed over the Pacific
Ocean killing one passenger before safely landing in Honolulu.

Pan Am flight 73 : On September 5, 1986Pan Am flight 73, was

taken over by hijackers while on a scheduled stop in Karachi. The
flight never departed Karachi, but 20 people were killed.
Pan Am Flight 103 : On December 21, 1988 Pan Am flight 103
flying from London Heathrow AirporttoNew York John F. Kennedy
Airport, was blown up and crashed onLockerbie, Scotland when an
explosive was detonated in its forward cargo hold. The main body of
the plain carried on for 13 miles before
coming to ground in the small Scottish village of Lockerbie. The total
search
area spanned 845 square miles and debris turned up as far as 80
miles from
Lockerbie. . A total of 270 people lost their lives, including 11 in
Lockerbie. One
witness told television interviewers the sky was actually raining fire.

The Pan Am 103 disaster was the final blow to airlines reputation and
trust among the passengers world over.
Consequences of such accidents :

The airlines lost basic trust of security in its customers.

People started associating Pan Am as a major target for terrorists.

Despite the companys constant promises of commitment to

increasing its airlines security, the public was simply not willing to fly
with Pan Am anymore.

Ultimately the company stood helpless to reinforce the diminishing

relation with its customers and people in general.

After three years of flying with empty seats since Pan Am flight 103
disaster , in 1991 the company went bankrupt and shut down.
 Lesson from Pam Am
Some crises are too big to recover from. Pan Am
handled the Lockerbie disaster as best as it could,
but the decline in public confidence proved too
much leading to ultimately shutting down of the
airlines.