Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2005 Taken from the

Look in the text and find this information as quickly as possible: 
1. What is the name of Afghanistan’s national airline? 
2. How many employees does Ariana have? 
3. How much money does the manager of Ariana earn each month? 
4. When was Ariana founded? 
5. When did the US invade Afghanistan? 
6. How many flights does Ariana now operate each week? 
It’s four o'clock in the afternoon and a hundreds of employees are leaving the 
headquarters of Ariana, Afghanistan's national airline. In the boardroom, one 
man stays behind. Dr Muhammad Atash, a man with a kind but worried face, 
sits in his chair and rubs his eyes. Ariana faces a number of "difficulties", he 
explains. "Employees steal from the company. They give jobs to members of 
their family. There’s a lot of bureaucracy. There aren’t many qualified staff and 
a lot of people prefer not to do any work." But then he pauses. "I believe we 
are starting to make progress." 

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©
Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2006 
Taken from the Magazine
section in 
www.onestopenglish.com
Ariana is different from most other airlines for many reasons, all of them bad. 
Its history is terrible. During Afghanistan's quarter of a century of war, Ariana 
planes were shut down, shot down or hijacked. No-one chooses to fly Ariana 
today. It has a disastrous safety record and this means it cannot fly to most 
European and American airports. It is nicknamed "Scaryana". UN officials and 
foreign diplomats are not allowed to take Ariana flights. And most of the 1,700 
staff are, according to Atash, either extremely incompetent or corrupt.
Is Ariana the world's worst airline? Perhaps not. There are many bad airlines 
in the developing world. "Ariana is no worse than many others," says David 
Learmount at 
Flight International
magazine. "If a country has no safety 
culture, neither does its airline." But Ariana has one advantage over other 
disaster airlines – it has a rescue plan. Atash, a straight-talking Afghan-
American emigre, returned three years ago from the USA where he ran a 
business. He was given the job of manager at Ariana in June.
It is not a glamorous job. Atash is paid just $100 a month and uses his own 
mobile phone. But he has a can-do attitude and plans to get rid of hundreds of 
incompetent staff. It is a difficult task but he is not alone. In comes Hanns 
Marienfeld, the leader of a six-strong team from Lufthansa hired to help with 
the rescue plan. He describes the state of Ariana one year ago: "It was not up 
to international standards," he says. "It had no flight schedule. Customers had 
to pay a bribe to get a ticket, a second bribe to get a boarding pass and 
sometimes a third to get their seat in business class. We flew here or there, 
whenever the pilots felt like it." Initial safety standards were not good. In 2003 
and 2004, Ariana's fleet of six planes suffered six major engine failures. "In 
Germany, our pilots only see that sort of thing in a flight simulator. In Ariana 
we do it in real life," says Marienfeld.
The early years were very different. Ariana was founded in 1955 and quickly 
gained a reputation as a small but proud regional carrier. It flew hippies and 
adventurers from London, Paris and Frankfurt and brought honeymooning 
couples from neighbouring Pakistan. But in 1973, King Zahir Shah was 
overthrown and five years later a civil war began. The visitors vanished and 
Ariana, like the rest of Afghanistan, suffered very badly. 
During the 10-year Soviet occupation, when the roads were too dangerous, 
Ariana became the safest way to travel. But the sense of security was relative. 
The mujahideen fighters who were fighting the Soviet forces were armed with 
American anti-aircraft missiles. So Ariana pilots had to learn how to avoid the 
missiles while taking off and landing. Some staff could take no more. On a 
flight to Kandahar in 1989, a fight broke out between the pilot and the co-pilot. 
The pilot wanted to fly the plane to Iran. The co-pilot did not want to go. As 
they fought for the controls, the plane fell out of the sky, crashing into the 
desert near the Iranian border. All six people on board died.

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©
Macmillan Publishers Ltd 2006 
Taken from the Magazine
section in 
www.onestopenglish.com
After the Soviet departure the airline went from bad to worse. When the 
Taliban took control of Kabul a year later, they brought their 7
th
century ideas 
to Ariana's 20th-century business. They sent the stewardesses home, banned 
inflight music and gave the job of director to a 26-year-old religious fanatic.
The UN imposed an international flight ban on the airline as part of UN 
sanctions against the Taliban. The company's reputation for disaster got 
bigger as its fleet of ageing aircraft got smaller. The former prime minister 
died in a 1997 crash; two accidents in 1998 killed about 100 people. In 2000, 
a flight from Kabul to Mazar-i-Sharif was hijacked to Stansted airport in the 
UK.
In 2001, the US led an international invasion of Afghanistan. This should have 
saved Ariana but instead it almost destroyed the company. US planes 
bombed the Ariana fleet, destroying six of its eight planes. The Taliban took 
$500,000 in company cash and ran.
Now a process of change has begun. The number of flights has increased 
from 10 to 15 a week. Ariana management says 85% of flights are on time. 
Ariana made a modest $1m profit last year. At Kabul airport the mechanics 
have new tools and new pilots are being trained. The old Kabul office will 
close soon and a modern sales centre, complete with young, enthusiastic staff 
and computerised booking, will open soon. 
Meanwhile Atash plans to ask half his 1,700 staff to stay at home but continue 
their pay. "We are building the system with completely new people. We 
cannot mix them with the corrupt old ones," says Atash. Success is not 
guaranteed, however, and there is now a battle for control of the company. 
"We're going to fight all the way," Atash promises. "Because the other option 
is to sit here and do nothing. And that's not an option - either for Ariana or for 
Afghanistan."