10 years is a long time. When Your Airways were born, FS9 (Microsoft Flight Simulator 2004 – a Century of flight) was the main platform, pilots flew on 2D panels with 4:3 ratio and 1080 resolution was still to come. To put it to a perspective, then iPhone was introduced only a year earlier, than the idea to start an independent Estonian virtual airline – Your Airways took off. Many things have changed over time, so have we.
As with every project, real or virtual, there are ups and downs. We have seen bad times and great success as well. Running a fictional airline in a small country, like Estonia, with only 1+ million residents is not so easy. Real-life Estonian airlines have the challenge to find enough local passengers, we have had a similar challenge of finding local online flying pilots. Besides the challenge, we have managed to attract more and more of the niche hobby, flight simulation, users from the country and introduced them to the world of online flying. This smallness of us is actually beneficial and unique. Most of the other virtual airlines in the world cannot say, that majority of their members has met in real life and had a beer or two with each other over the years.
Virtual aviation, as real aviation, is a dynamic environment. As in real-world, many external factors may change the face and focus of the airline, they can even cease the operations. We are not driven by fuel prices or the economic situation of the world, but we are heavily dependent on the networks we operate and even more – the add-ons for the simulator. If there is a new state of the art aircraft add-on or scenery, we must react, so that our pilots could enjoy up-to-date graphics and features. Here is our story, as short as possible, divided into periods.