SkyWest Gets High Marks
May 08, 2018
By VIC BRADSHAW
Daily News-Record 5/8/18
WEYERS CAVE — When he’d flown in the past, Charles Hendricks said, he’d never used Shenandoah Valley Regional Airport.
The architect with the Gaines Group’s Harrisonburg office said he tried with a previous carrier once, but his flight was canceled and the airline got him to Washington Dulles International Airport by taxi.
Despite that bad experience, Hendricks booked flights to and from Chicago last week because he was attending a risk management training conference there for the construction industry. He’s glad he did.
“It was great,” he said in a Monday afternoon phone interview of his experience on the United Express flight operated by SkyWest Airlines. “It was the best flight experience I’ve had going out of a town and arriving in town.”
Hendricks wasn’t alone in experiencing SkyWest’s much-ballyhooed service.
Greg Campbell, executive director of the Weyers Cave airport, said about 1,400 people took SkyWest flights from or to SVRA during its 27 days of operation in April. That’s more than the 900 passengers ViaAir moved in April 2017 and well above the 300 who flew Via in March, its final month serving SVRA.
“They’ve exceeded our expectations based on the issues the community has had in the past,” Campbell said of the passenger loads SkyWest has carried coming off years of unreliable service by other carriers.
On Time Or Early
So far, Campbell said, Sky-West — a St. George, Utah, regional airline flying as United Express — has had to cancel just one flight into SVRA and one outbound flight. It’s providing a total of 19 flights to and from Dulles or Chicago O’Hare International Airport each week.
The last inbound and outbound flights on April 15 were nixed due to severe weather, he said. Multiple tornadoes were reported in the region, and a recreational airplane crashed in Albemarle County, killing the pilot.
Campbell said he monitors flights regularly, even nights and weekends, and routinely sees that flights are arriving and departing on time, a few minutes early, or no more than five minutes late.
“They’ve gotten their passengers to the hub on time,” he said, referring to the importance of timely arrival so passengers can catch connecting flights elsewhere.
SkyWest, said Campbell, has a reputation of turning around underperforming markets, and early signs indicate they’re doing that at Shenandoah Valley Regional.
“They’ve just been fantastic,” he said. “By industry standards, they’ve been exceptional in pretty much every area — customer service, flight operations. It’s been phenomenal.”
Campbell never gushed like that about Via. The Orlando, Fla.-based airline canceled or ran late on so many flights that U.S. Department of Transportation officials agreed to remove the company from the market just nine months into a two-year contract.
SkyWest was selected after the market was rebid. To serve SVRA for two years under the Essential Air Service program, it will receive a federal subsidy of up to $2.9 million a year, money that comes from fees air travelers pay whenever they purchase a ticket.
Positive Feedback
Sue Simmons of Sikeston, Mo., praised the service Monday afternoon as she was boarding a flight to O’Hare.
She’d flown into SVRA about 10 days earlier on a trip to visit family.
“It was excellent,” Simmons said of her flight from Chicago to Weyers Cave. “Everybody seemed so friendly and relaxed.”
She said she’d flown into SVRA with other carriers on past trips and found SkyWest’s service superior.
Eric Wagenlander, a Charleston, S.C., resident who’d flown to the Valley Monday to visit a friend, also gave the service high marks.
“There were no problems at all,” said Wagenlander, who flies monthly. “The staff was friendly. The flight was easy.”
Tim Donovan of Nexus Services in Verona flew in Monday afternoon, returning from Florida.
Loading at Dulles, he said, was “a little disorganized” because passengers for multiple flights were funneled to planes through a single door, but otherwise the experience was “fine.”
As for his Chicago trip, Hendricks said his biggest problem with flying out of SVRA was that he arrived at the terminal an hour before his flight when 20 or 30 minutes would have sufficed.
Given the reception Sky-West’s service has received and its performance so far, Campbell said he’s looking forward to watching use grow through the summer and into the fall.
“I’m really optimistic,” he said, “with where this thing is going.”
Passengers exit a United Express flight operated by SkyWest Airlines on Monday at Shenandoah Valley Regional Airport. SVRA officials say that one month into serving the airport, SkyWest’s performance has been “phenomenal.”
Daily News-Record 5/8/18
WEYERS CAVE — When he’d flown in the past, Charles Hendricks said, he’d never used Shenandoah Valley Regional Airport.
The architect with the Gaines Group’s Harrisonburg office said he tried with a previous carrier once, but his flight was canceled and the airline got him to Washington Dulles International Airport by taxi.
Despite that bad experience, Hendricks booked flights to and from Chicago last week because he was attending a risk management training conference there for the construction industry. He’s glad he did.
“It was great,” he said in a Monday afternoon phone interview of his experience on the United Express flight operated by SkyWest Airlines. “It was the best flight experience I’ve had going out of a town and arriving in town.”
Hendricks wasn’t alone in experiencing SkyWest’s much-ballyhooed service.
Greg Campbell, executive director of the Weyers Cave airport, said about 1,400 people took SkyWest flights from or to SVRA during its 27 days of operation in April. That’s more than the 900 passengers ViaAir moved in April 2017 and well above the 300 who flew Via in March, its final month serving SVRA.
“They’ve exceeded our expectations based on the issues the community has had in the past,” Campbell said of the passenger loads SkyWest has carried coming off years of unreliable service by other carriers.
On Time Or Early
So far, Campbell said, Sky-West — a St. George, Utah, regional airline flying as United Express — has had to cancel just one flight into SVRA and one outbound flight. It’s providing a total of 19 flights to and from Dulles or Chicago O’Hare International Airport each week.
The last inbound and outbound flights on April 15 were nixed due to severe weather, he said. Multiple tornadoes were reported in the region, and a recreational airplane crashed in Albemarle County, killing the pilot.
Campbell said he monitors flights regularly, even nights and weekends, and routinely sees that flights are arriving and departing on time, a few minutes early, or no more than five minutes late.
“They’ve gotten their passengers to the hub on time,” he said, referring to the importance of timely arrival so passengers can catch connecting flights elsewhere.
SkyWest, said Campbell, has a reputation of turning around underperforming markets, and early signs indicate they’re doing that at Shenandoah Valley Regional.
“They’ve just been fantastic,” he said. “By industry standards, they’ve been exceptional in pretty much every area — customer service, flight operations. It’s been phenomenal.”
Campbell never gushed like that about Via. The Orlando, Fla.-based airline canceled or ran late on so many flights that U.S. Department of Transportation officials agreed to remove the company from the market just nine months into a two-year contract.
SkyWest was selected after the market was rebid. To serve SVRA for two years under the Essential Air Service program, it will receive a federal subsidy of up to $2.9 million a year, money that comes from fees air travelers pay whenever they purchase a ticket.
Positive Feedback
Sue Simmons of Sikeston, Mo., praised the service Monday afternoon as she was boarding a flight to O’Hare.
She’d flown into SVRA about 10 days earlier on a trip to visit family.
“It was excellent,” Simmons said of her flight from Chicago to Weyers Cave. “Everybody seemed so friendly and relaxed.”
She said she’d flown into SVRA with other carriers on past trips and found SkyWest’s service superior.
Eric Wagenlander, a Charleston, S.C., resident who’d flown to the Valley Monday to visit a friend, also gave the service high marks.
“There were no problems at all,” said Wagenlander, who flies monthly. “The staff was friendly. The flight was easy.”
Tim Donovan of Nexus Services in Verona flew in Monday afternoon, returning from Florida.
Loading at Dulles, he said, was “a little disorganized” because passengers for multiple flights were funneled to planes through a single door, but otherwise the experience was “fine.”
As for his Chicago trip, Hendricks said his biggest problem with flying out of SVRA was that he arrived at the terminal an hour before his flight when 20 or 30 minutes would have sufficed.
Given the reception Sky-West’s service has received and its performance so far, Campbell said he’s looking forward to watching use grow through the summer and into the fall.
“I’m really optimistic,” he said, “with where this thing is going.”
Passengers exit a United Express flight operated by SkyWest Airlines on Monday at Shenandoah Valley Regional Airport. SVRA officials say that one month into serving the airport, SkyWest’s performance has been “phenomenal.”
