Private company

Filipinas Orient Airways

Airline from the Philippines

Filipinas Orient Airways, Inc. was an airline founded by the originally Lebanese refugee family Karam (later Caram) in the Philippines in 1964, under Republic Act No. 4147. FOA was granted the franchise to provide air transport service in the Philippines and between the Philippines and other countries on June 20, 1964, despite legal opposition by Philippine Airlines. The company slogan was The Nation's Flag Carrier.2 It is headquartered in Manila.1 It ceased to exist in 1972.1 Wikipedia text CC BY-SA 4.0

Last updated Oct 21, 2026.

Overview

1964Founded1
  • HeadquartersManila1
Filipinas Orient Airways Caravelle Volpati
Photo: Christian Volpati, GFDL 1.2, via Wikimedia Commons4

Filipinas Orient Airways, Inc. was an airline founded by the originally Lebanese refugee family Karam (later Caram) in the Philippines in 1964, under Republic Act No. 4147. FOA was granted the franchise to provide air transport service in the Philippines and between the Philippines and other countries on June 20, 1964, despite legal opposition by Philippine Airlines. The company slogan was The Nation's Flag Carrier.2

Products and brands

Service

FOA—also known as "Fairways"—started their domestic flight operations in the Philippines on January 5, 1965, using DC-3 aircraft [1].

Their early days appear to have been crash-ridden with the loss of four DC-3 and one DC-6 within the first 4 years of operation.

They went on to operate Sud Aviation Caravelles [2] and Nord 262, later to be replaced

by NAMC YS-11.

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Their flight operations were ended after the declaration of Martial Law by then Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos on September 21, 1972. Philippine Airlines eventually took over the planes and routes of FOA.

Fleet

Douglas DC-3A

Sud Aviation Caravelle

NAMC YS-11

Nord 262

From Wikipedia’s article on Filipinas Orient Airways, shared under CC BY-SA 4.0.3

Timeline

  1. 1972Dissolved Dissolved1
  2. 1964Founded Founded1

Sources

The numbers on this page point here. Each one links to the record it came from.

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