G-EUPJ is an Airbus A319-131, msn 1232, and since March 2019 it has worn the colours of British European Airways. World Airline News reported that British Airways painted it to mark the airline's centenary, and that the design would stay on the aircraft until it retired the following year, 2020. In 2026 it is still flying.

The paint

BEA, the predecessor airline, flew this livery mainly on domestic and European routes between 1959 and 1968, according to World Airline News. The retro jet has one deliberate difference: grey upper wings instead of the traditional red, to meet current wing paint reflectivity requirements. The red is still there underneath. A photograph taken on approach to Heathrow on 11 October 2025 shows the underside of the wing painted red, with the registration across it.

Storage and return

G-EUPJ was delivered to British Airways in May 2000, according to Travel Radar, which called it just over 24 years old in June 2024. That article says the aircraft spent about 570 days in storage before it returned to service. It left storage in Madrid on 12 June 2024 and landed at Heathrow at 14:15 BST. Later that day it flew BA1498 to Glasgow, which Travel Radar described as its first commercial flight since its "retirement".

Still in the paint

A photograph on Wikimedia Commons dated 12 August 2026 is titled "BEA retro livery on G-EUPJ", so the jet was wearing the paint less than two months before I caught it. The licence on that photograph is CC BY-SA, so I have linked it below rather than used it.

On my screen

The BBBRadar desk unit shows type, registration, route where one is filed, callsign and altitude. On 6 October 2026 it showed Airbus A319, G-EUPJ, EDI to LHR, SHT9G, at 12,125 feet: Edinburgh to Heathrow. The screen shows the airframe, not the paint, so the photographs above are what show the livery.

Another A319, G-DBCD, crossed the same screen that day as SHT3G, Manchester to Heathrow, at 8,000 feet.

What I have not confirmed

I have not seen a current retirement date for G-EUPJ, so none is stated here. The 2020 retirement was the plan reported in March 2019, not a fact about today.

Sources