Source: Wikipedia. Pages: 46. Chapters: Aerospace companies of the United Arab Emirates, Airlines of the United Arab Emirates, Airports in the United Arab Emirates, Aviation accidents and incidents in the United Arab Emirates, United Arab Emirates Air Force, United Arab Emirati aviators, Dubai International Airport, Etihad Airways, Al Maktoum International Airport, UPS Airlines Flight 6, Emirates SkyCargo, Abu Dhabi International Airport, Sharjah International Airport, Air Arabia, Azza Transport Flight 2241, Daallo Airlines, Dubai Aerospace Enterprise, Kish Air Flight 7170, RAK Airways, Flydubai, Ahmed bin Saif Al Nahyan, Ajman International Airport, RUS Aviation, List of airports in the United Arab Emirates, Sterling Airways Flight 296, Falcon Aviation Services, Kang Pacific Airlines, List of airlines of the United Arab Emirates, Maximus Air Cargo, Midex Airlines, GCAAUAE, Al Ain International Airport, British Gulf International Airlines, Western Aviation, Gulf Air Flight 771, Eastern SkyJets, Dubai Aviation City Corporation, Abu Dhabi Aviation, Ras Al Khaimah International Airport, Dubai Royal Air Wing, Click Airways, Dubai Airshow, AVE.com, Royal Jet, Jupiter Airlines, Fujairah International Airport, SkyLink Arabia, Falcon Express Cargo Airlines, Kinshasa Airways, Dolphin Air, Aerovista, General Civil Aviation Authority, Cargo Plus Aviation, Al Jaber Aviation, Al Rais Cargo, Palm Aviation, Air Cess. Excerpt: Emirates (Arabic: ¿ ¿ayaran al-Imarat) is the flag carrier of Dubai, United Arab Emirates. It is the largest airline in the Middle East, operating over 2,400 passenger flights per week, from its hub at Dubai International Airport Terminal 3, to 111 cities in 62 countries across six continents. The company also operates three of the world's ten longest non-stop commercial flights from Dubai to Los Angeles, San Francisco and Houston. Emirates is a subsidiary of The Emirates Group, which has over 50,000 employees, and is wholly owned by the government of Dubai directly under the Investment Corporation of Dubai. Cargo activities are undertaken by the Emirates Group's Emirates SkyCargo division. During the mid-1980s, Gulf Air began to cut back its services to Dubai. As a result Emirates was conceived in March 1985 with backing from Dubai's royal family, whose Dubai Royal Air Wing provided two of the airline's first aircraft. It was required to operate independent of government subsidies, apart from $10 million in start-up capital. The airline became headed by Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, the airline's present chairman. In the years following its founding, the airline expanded both its fleet and its destinations. In October 2008, Emirates moved all operations at Dubai International Airport to Terminal 3, a new terminal exclusively dedicated to Emirates to sustain its rapid expansion and growth plans. Emirates operates a mixed fleet of Airbus and Boeing wide-body aircraft and is one of only nine airlines to operate an all-wide-body aircraft fleet, whose centrepiece is the Boeing 777. Emirates also has orders for 90 Airbus A380s with 15 of them already in service and became the second operator of the Airbus A380-800 after Singapore Airlines when their first aircraft was delivered on 28 July 2008. Emirates has won numerous awards and is an industry bellwether for aircraft purchases, purchasing over 130 aircraft in 2007 alone. The airline ranks amongst the top 10 carriers worl