Hi Fly

Is Hi Fly safe?

Yes, with a caveat about its age. Hi Fly's Portuguese company has flown since 2006 without an accident, it works under the same European rules as TAP Air Portugal, and it holds IATA's IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary safety audit. The catch is that by 2026 only two aircraft fly on this certificate, an A330-200 from about 2008 and an A321 from 1999, and Portugal's investigation board did not let us check its files. We score it 81.

Most people who fly Hi Fly never booked it. The company rents out aircraft with pilots, cabin crew, maintenance and insurance, a deal known as a wet lease or ACMI, and the seats are sold under another airline's name.

Two certificates, one brand

Hi Fly was set up in Lisbon in 2005 by the Mirpuri family and received its Portuguese air operator certificate in 2006, starting with one leased Airbus A330. In 2013 the group added a second certificate in Malta. In August 2021 the Portuguese company changed its legal name to SpringJet, S.A., but kept the Hi Fly brand, the IATA code 5K and the ICAO code HFY, with the call sign SKY FLYER. Co-founder Paulo Mirpuri died in May 2026; the other co-founder, Carlos Mirpuri, a pilot who still flies the Antarctic missions, now chairs the group.

Today the Maltese company, Hi Fly Malta, flies most of the group's jets: nine A330s and four A340s registered 9H-. The Portuguese certificate carries two, CS-TCE and CS-TRJ. Under our rules each event counts on the certificate whose crew flew it, so this page covers the CS- aircraft and Hi Fly Malta has its own record. The line is blurred in daily operation. Hi Fly's own charters often carry 5K flight numbers even on Maltese jets: in December 2022, flight 5K703 from Lisbon to Maceió and Fortaleza was the Maltese A340 9H-SOL. The registration on the aircraft, not the flight number, tells you which company flies you.

What has gone wrong

No accident in 20 years is a solid result for a company that flies wherever clients send it. Two events stand out, and neither counts in our score.

At Darwin in February 2012, an A340-300 on a charter for the Royal Australian Air Force landed in a microburst during heavy rain and hit the runway at 2.71 g. Australia's ATSB found that the crew had added thrust to stop a sudden sink at 55 feet; a hard-landing inspection followed, and several landing-gear parts were replaced. Nobody was hurt, so we treat it as an incident, and it is older than our 10-year incident window.

At Cologne in the early hours of 18 September 2016, A330-200 CS-TQW, flying for Iceland's WOW Air with 163 passengers, landed on the shorter runway while the main one was closed for works. After the autopilot was switched off the jet sank below the glide path, and its main wheels touched down 15 to 21 metres before the threshold, destroying a runway light and damaging a tyre. Germany's BFU classed it as a serious incident. The crew had flown a radar-guided approach because the aircraft was not approved for satellite approaches there.

Since then we found nothing serious on the Portuguese jets in AeroInside, the BEA's register of notified events or the Aviation Safety Network data. That clean decade is less informative than it sounds: the Portuguese fleet shrank as the Maltese one grew, and GPIAAF, the board that would investigate any event in Portugal, blocked our access.

How old are the planes?

Old, by airline standards. CS-TCE is an A330-200 with serial number 925, built around 2008, fitted with 268 seats in three classes. CS-TRJ is an A321 built in 1999, with 220 seats in one class and a seat pitch of 28 inches. Both are fly-by-wireFly-by-wireA flight control system in which the pilot's inputs go to computers, which then move the control surfaces. Many such systems also stop unsafe manoeuvres.More in the glossary Airbus types with good safety records, but neither is a current-generation model, and an operator with two aircraft has no spare when one breaks down far from home. In 2019 the group took an A330-900neo, but our sources no longer list it in the fleet.

Who checks Hi Fly?

Portugal's National Civil Aviation Authority (ANAC) issues the certificate under EASA rules, and Portugal has the FAA's Category 1FAA IASAThe US FAA's check of whether a country's aviation regulator meets ICAO standards. Category 1 means it does; Category 2 means it does not.More in the glossary rating. Hi Fly is an IATA member, which requires an IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary audit; the company says it first passed IOSA in 2011. That gives oversight a score of 90, the same as World2fly Portugal, another Lisbon wet-lease airline, which holds IOSA without being an IATA member.

Before you board a Hi Fly flight

• Look up the registration. CS- means the Portuguese company on this page; 9H- means Hi Fly Malta. Both are European airlines with IOSAIOSAThe IATA Operational Safety Audit, an international audit of an airline's safety management and operations. Every IATA member must pass it.More in the glossary, but their records differ.
• Expect a different cabin. An A330 hired by Azul or Etihad keeps Hi Fly's seats and entertainment; legroom, meals and the business-class product can differ from what the airline sells.
• Plan for delays when a jet breaks. With two aircraft on this certificate, a technical fault abroad can mean a long wait for a replacement from Lisbon or Malta, so allow for it on tight onward connections.

How we scored it

Oversight (90) and a 20-year record without an accident (89) carry the score. Incidents (80) are clean in our window but thinly published. The fleet (58) is two ageing Airbus jets, and the environment (65) reflects short-notice work in Brazil, Israel and the Middle East. Overall 81.