We checked 5,686 aviation websites: 1 in 8 has changed or disappeared
Radu BalasPublished 3 min readWhen an aviation company closes, merges or forgets to renew its domain, the website does not simply disappear. The address goes back on the market, and someone else can buy it, together with all the links that still point to it from other websites.
In October 2026 we checked the website of every company in the Flying Engineer directory, 5,686 sites in all, to keep our listings accurate. This is what we found.
The numbers
701 of the 5,686 websites (12.3%), about 1 in 8, had moved, broken or disappeared.
- 4,479 websites (78.8%) worked normally.
- 314 (5.5%) had moved to a new address, usually after a rename or a merger.
- 274 (4.8%) domains no longer exist at all. We checked each of them twice.
- 59 (1.0%) showed "page not found".
- 31 (0.5%) were parked, expired or for sale, most of them on domain marketplaces.
- 23 (0.4%) domains that once belonged to aviation businesses now show gambling, casino or lottery sites.
The remaining 506 sites blocked automated checks or were temporarily down, so we did not count them either way.
That last group is the one that matters most for the rest of the industry.
Examples we tracked
These domains once belonged to aviation businesses. Today they show something very different. The companies themselves have nothing to do with the new content: their domain expired or lapsed, and somebody else bought it. We rechecked every example on 11 October 2026.
| Old aviation business | Domain | What it shows now |
|---|---|---|
| Edinburgh Flying Club | edinburghflyingclub.co.uk | An online casino |
| Coyote Flight Centers | iflycfc.com | An online slot gambling site |
| Laurentide Aviation | laurentideaviation.com | A lottery betting site |
| Border Air Training, Carlisle | borderair.co.uk | An online casino |
| Four Star Aviation | 4staraviation.com | A betting site |
| Asian Institute of Aviation | asianinstituteofaviation.com | A betting site |
| National Air College | nationalaircollege.com | A gambling site |
| Pilgrim Aviation | flypilgrim.com | Redirects to a betting site |
| Helios Aviation | heliosaviation.com | Redirects to a lottery results site |
| Chamberlain Aviation | chamberlainaviation.com | Redirects to a lottery results site |
| Fairmont State University aeronautics | fairmontstateaeronautics.com | A lottery site |
| Aeroclub Krila Podgorice | krila-podgorice.me | Redirects to a betting site |
We have not linked to any of these domains on purpose.
Why buyers of old domains want aviation names
An old domain keeps its history. Search engines and other websites have linked to it for years: airports listing their resident flight school, aero club associations, local news stories, pilot forums and directories. Spammers buy expired domains for exactly those links, then put up casino or lottery pages that borrow the trust the old business built.
Most of the time nobody notices. The flight school has closed or rebranded, and the sites linking to it never check their old links.
The problem for everyone still linking to them
If your website links to one of these domains, visitors who click it land on a gambling site. For an airport, a flying club or a training organisation, that is a poor experience and a reputation risk, especially when student pilots follow the link. Search engines can also treat links to spam as a negative signal about the page that contains them.
What aviation companies can do
- Renew your domain for several years, and keep it even after a rebrand or merger. Point it to your new site rather than letting it lapse.
- If you close or sell the business, decide what happens to the domain. Redirect it to the buyer, or keep it parked under your control.
- Check the links on your own site once a year, especially pages listing partners, schools, suppliers or members. A link checker takes minutes.
- Update your directory listings when you rename or move, so people find the new address.
How we handle it at Flying Engineer
When a company website in our directory stops working, is parked or starts showing unrelated content, we remove the link from the company's page. On this check we removed 329 such links, including all of those that now lead to gambling sites. When we can confirm that a company was acquired, merged or renamed, we record it on our page of aviation companies closed, merged or renamed and point visitors to the company it became.
If your company is listed with an old website address, claim your page to update it.