Ladeco Ladeco Ladeco was a Chilean airline; Ladeco is the acronym of "Línea Aérea Del Cobre" or the "Airline of Copper," in reference to the principal Chilean export. Ladeco began operations in 1958 flying mostly internal routes between Chile's major cities and some international routes, and continued to run services until 1994 when LanChile (currently called Latam Chile) bought over 99% of the shares and merged Ladeco into its fleet. At the time of takeover, Ladeco was equipped mainly with Boeing 737 aircraft as well as some Boeing 727s and Boeing 757s. Ladeco then became exclusively an internal carrier between Chilean
Sun Country Airlines DC-10 in early 2001. In June 1999, the management of Sun Country launched a transformation from a charter carrier into a scheduled airline. New service from Minneapolis and Milwaukee began to destinations including Los Angeles, Seattle, Detroit, Washington, D.C. and Phoenix. The airline also started a frequent flyer program, Smile Awards. In 2001, Sun Country began to replace its entire fleet with Boeing 737 aircraft. As Sun Country reinvented itself, heavy competition from local incumbent carrier Northwest Airlines and the September 11 attacks caused a sharp decrease of traffic and revenue. The airline was losing large amounts of money by