Over the past few years, I’ve extensively covered Global Airlines, the strange “airline startup” that had a single Airbus A380, with which it wanted to bring back the “golden age” of travel. The carrier’s A380 has been parked since the spring of 2025, and just several months ago, I covered how the company faced several winding up petitions. Well, there’s now an update, which seems long overdue…
Global Airlines given winding up orders by court
Public records in the UK show that Global Airlines has finally been given winding up orders, which is the equivalent of liquidation. This is in response to a petition that was filed on May 29, 2026, and a court approved that order on November 4, 2026. This has only been added to public records today, as there seems to be a one week period between when these decisions are made, and when they’re published for the public.
This means that a government officer from the Insolvency Service will now become the liquidator, and take control of the company, investigate its affairs and the conduct of directors, and collect whatever assets still exist for creditors. This means that the directors no longer have control of the company.
What’s amazing about this entire story is that in the spring of 2025, the company actually operated two roundtrip flights to New York out of Europe, for reasons that most of us couldn’t really make sense of. For that matter, this was part of a wet lease agreement with Portuguese charter company Hi-Fly, given that Global Airlines lacked its own operating certificate.
Shortly after the A380 operated those flights, it entered long term storage, as it needed to undergo heavy maintenance, which costs millions of dollars. The company’s founder, James Asquith, had insisted that the reason the plane was parked for so long was due to delays with being able to get heavy maintenance.
Just months ago, Asquith suggested that the airline would be flying to the Maldives before the end of 2026, despite no progress having been made on the heavy maintenance front.
The Global Airlines story will make a great documentary
Obviously on the surface, the whole Global Airlines thing sounds a bit odd. But let me simply say that the public knows only a tiny fraction of what was really going on here. That’s true both in terms of what Asquith was showing investors to get them onboard with the concept, and also what he claimed the goals for the company were.
My skepticism with this concept wasn’t because I don’t like to see other people succeed, or because I’m against innovation, or anything like that. Instead, it’s because things aren’t always what they seem, and when you’re raising millions of dollars of other people’s money and selling them a dream, there has to be some chance of that actually becoming a reality.
I’d encourage those who just went along with Asquith to be a little introspective here. For example, when you have publications like SimpleFlying that publish things about Global Airlines without even an ounce of skepticism, and then you have people like Captain Chris who latch on to people like Asquith as if they’re Richard Branson (which he literally compared him to, while pointing out that he was proving the doubters wrong), that’s a problem.
Many people lost many millions of dollars on this venture. Now, I’d also encourage them to perhaps be a bit more careful next time. And if you just want to make a donation to someone with no expectation of any return, I’m also happy to wire you my bank account details. 😉
Bottom line
It’s the end of the road (or runway) for Global Airlines, as the A380 “airline” has had its winding up petition approved, meaning the company will now be liquidated. It was only a matter of time before this was going to happen, so I don’t think anyone will be surprised. Hopefully one day the entire story can come to light…
What do you make of Global Airlines liquidating?
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