British Airways is to sell its Stansted Airport-based low-cost airline Go, it has been announced.

The news came as BA announced a 37.5 per cent dip in half-yearly profits.

BA said today (Monday): "Following the successful establishment of Go as a leading no-frills airline in Europe, BA intends to realise the value created and offer the subsidiary for sale." Go is based at Stansted Airport in Essex.

BA announced that pre-tax profits for the period April-September 2000 were £150 million compared to £240 million in April-September 1999.

More encouragingly - and at a time when Concorde has been grounded - the airline recorded £200 million pre-tax profits for the July-September period this year, compared to just £40 million in the same period of 1999.

BA said the improvement reflected a higher mix of premium passengers and better average fares, combined with continued cost efficiencies.

BA was also able to point to a more than doubling of operating profit to £264 million in July-September 2000 "despite the impact of higher fuel prices and the suspension of Concorde services".

On the future of supersonic airline services, which were halted following last July's Air France Concorde crash which claimed 113 lives, BA said: "We remain confident that the Civil Aviation Authority in the UK will re-issue the certificate of airworthiness; services will resume as soon as possible."

Converted for the new archive on 19 November 2001. Some images and formatting may have been lost in the conversion.