ANA

ANA, an acronym for All Nippon Airways, is an airline that was first established in 1952 as Japan Helicopters and Aeroplane Transports Corporation. The company was a direct result of World War II because of the Japanese Government's neccesity to re establish air transport within the country.

ANA, which now ranks among the world's largest airline companies, had very humble beginnings, as for the first few decades, the company was basically only a domestic operator. In February of 1953, helicopter service was started and soon after, passenger charter flights followed. 1955 saw the beginning of a new and profitable ANA route when Osaka was added from Tokyo with an inaugural cargo flight. That same year, the legendary Douglas[?] DC-3 plane began flying for Japan Helicopters and Aeroplane, and in 1957, the airline changed it's original name to it's current name of ANA. In 1958, tragedy touches ANA's door for the first time, when a DC-3, registration number JA5045, crashed. Better news came later that year when Far Eastern Aviation, a small competitor, merged with ANA, leaving the airline's total capital at 600 million Yen.

The 1960's was a period of slow but unstoppable growth for the company, and they started right off the bat, adding Viscount 744[?]'s to the fleet in 1960, and later Fairchild F-27[?]'s, in 1961. Another setback was suffered, however, when another DC-3, registration number JA5018, was lost in 1960. 1961 marked ANA's debut at the Tokyo Stock Exchance[?] as well as the Osaka Security Exchange[?]. 1963 saw another merger, this one with Fujita Koku K.K.[?], raising the company's capital to 4 billion yen.

In 1965, ANA finally joined the rest of the world by introducing jet services with Boeing 727's. The new members of ANA's fleet were soon joined by YS-11[?]'s.

1966 saw another tragedy happen. A Boeing 727 of ANA was landing in Tokyo when it went down, crashing on the waters of the Tokyo Bay[?]. All it's occupants died in the unfortunate accident. ANA had woken up to the crude reality, that perhaps for the next decade and a half or so, jet planes would have to be technologically modified constantly to achieve total flight security. Another tragedy, this time a crash of a YS-11, followed soon after.

These tragedies did not deter the airline from trying to keep on growing, however, and in 1969, ANA closed the decade of the 1960s by introducing Boeing 737 service.

The 1970's saw the beginning of ANA's internationalization. February 3 of 1971 in particular was a historic date for the airline, because ANA inaugurated it's first international service ever, a charter flight from Tokyo to Hong Kong. In March of that year, another crash hit the company, when another Boeing 727, registration number JA8329 suffered an accident. From this moment on and until 1999, the airline's planes would go on without any incidents. The L-1011[?] was introduced in 1973 and Boeing 747's in 1978.

During the 1980's ANA's movement towards reinforcing their fleet with jet airplanes and towards internationalization continued. Boeing 767's came to Tokyo to work for ANA in 1983, and in 1986, ANA's executives saw their dream of making of ANA an airline with regular international service materialize, when ANA started regular passenger service from Tokyo to Guam. Soon after, many cities such as Frankfurt, New York, Los Angeles, London and Paris were added.

ANA continued it's expansion of services all over Asia, North America and Europe during the 1990's, and Airbus equipment such as the A320, A321[?] and A340[?] were added to the fleet, as was the Boeing 747-400[?] jet. In 1994, ANA started service to Kansai International Airport and in 1999, it joined the Star Alliance[?] group along with some of the world's other leading airlines.

After the September 11 tragedy of 2001, an ANA 747 flying from Washington D.C. to Tokyo became the first plane to fly in the United States once the grounding of all planes in US territory was declared over by George W. Bush's government.

ANA's associate companies in Tokyo include Nippon Cargo Airlines (NCA) and ANK[?], which now over takes charter flights for ANA.

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ANA is also a medical abbreviation for anti-nuclear antibody. The presence of ANA helps to diagnose systemic lupus erythematosus, though they are non-specific and also appear in some other auto-immune diseases such as Sjögren's syndrome[?] or rheumatoid arthritis, and various non-rheumatological conditions associated with tissue damage.