From Fred Cox... http:;www.dc-8jet.com/iabdc863.htm nternational Air Bahama was created in 1968 in Miami, Florida to fly passengers Miami - Nassau - Shannon - Luxembourg and return at highly discounted fares which were found rarely on the transatlantic market. Initially, the airline leased a Boeing 707-355C from July 20, 1968 to October 1969. From October 1969 to May 1970 International Air Bahama switched to a DC-8F-55 leased from Seaboard World Airlines. Click Here To See Seaboard World DC-8F-55 Model & History. These flights were in direct competition with another low fare innovator - Loftleidir Icelandic Airlines which had been flying passengers at highly discounted fares from New York to Luxembourg via Iceland for decades. Loftleidir had up until this time used old prop airliners for this service but with International Air Bahama on the scene this forced Loftleidir Icelandic to upgrade their equipment - to Douglas DC-8-63CF jet equipment - also leased from Seaboard World Airlines. Additionally, in 1972, Loftleidir Icelandic decided to buy out International Air Bahama, shorten it's name to just Air Bahama & make it a subsidiary of Loftleider. The combination of the two discount airlines brought new route opportunities & combinations. To cope with the resulting greater demand a larger DC-8-63CF for Air Bahama was also leased from Seaboard World Airlines. Click Here To See Air Bahama's DC-8 Fleet Information. Thus these two airlines became the economical way to travel between the USA & Europe during most of the 1970s. Their routes was somewhat circuitous (via either Nassau or Reykjavik) & the trip was a longer one but the price was cheap and demand was great. In 1973, after the first oil crisis had occurred, the Iceland Government decided to merge it's two main airlines - Flugfelag Islands (which flew within Iceland) and Loftleidir Icelandic (which flew the International Routes) into one airline - Icelandair which was governed by the parent company created named Flugleidir. Both Loftleider (and subsidiary Air Bahama) and Icelandair would all continue independent operations until 1979 when Loftleidir and Air Bahama were fully integrated into the surviving airline - Icelandair. Thus is the ending for a very colorful, if short-lived, airline which helped open up the transatlantic market to the "ordinary traveler" who wouldn't have been able to travel overseas otherwise.