1946. The war is over… but not for everyone. Demobbed pilot Jack Ruskin (Roy Marsden – The Sandbaggers) has developed a passion for aviation and he's determined to keep flying. Unable to find work with an established civilian airline, and armed with only his demob suit and a seventy-pound gratuity, he decides to launch his own air freight company with wartime colleague Peter Witney. Boasting just one plane, Ruskin Air Services is born amid the austerity of post-war Britain… and it's not only the Great Freeze that threatens to keep Jack's fledgling business on the ground.

Airline vividly brings to life the faltering and sometimes perilous progress of the independent airline operators of the Forties, encompassing landmark events such as the Berlin Airlift and capturing the excitement of the earliest passenger services. Richard Heffer (Colditz) and Polly Hemingway (Wallander) also star in this highly original series, devised and written by Wilfred Greatorex (The Power Game).