Nationality American Children 2 | Name Maurice Gallagher, | |
Occupation CEO and Chairman, Allegiant Travel Company Known for Commercial airline entrepreneur | ||
Maurice J. Gallagher Jr., also known as Maury Gallagher, is a commercial airline entrepreneur who has been associated with the startup and operation of three airlines, WestAir, ValuJet and Allegiant Air (subsidiary of Allegiant Travel Company), as well as several other non-aviation businesses in the telecommunications and adaptive learning fields. Two of Gallagher's three aviation companies, ValuJet and Allegiant Air, have been associated with safety violations and investigations, with the former being involved in a fatal air crash killing over one hundred people.
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Biography
Gallagher was a founder of WestAir, which operated from 1978 through 1992. He served as Vice President-Finance of the parent company of WestAirCommuter Holdings, Inc. from 1979 until 1982. From 1983 until August 1992, he served as an executive and director of WestAir Holding, Inc. until the company was acquired by Mesa Air in May 1992. WestAir functioned as the west-coast commuter/regional airline affiliate of United Airlines. Gallagher also was a member of the investment group that founded ValuJet Airlines, Inc. (one of the predecessors to AirTran Airways, Inc.) and served as a board member of ValuJet from its inception in 1993 until 1997.
A deadly 1996 ValuJet crash killed all 110 passengers on board, an incident from which the company never recovered. In a 1997 report on the incident, the National Transportation Safety Board determined that the probable causes were:
(1) the failure of SabreTech [a ValuJet contractor] to properly prepare, package, and identify unexpended chemical oxygen generators before presenting them to ValuJet for carriage; (2) the failure of ValuJet to properly oversee its contract maintenance program to ensure compliance with maintenance, maintenance training, and hazardous materials requirements and practices; and (3) the failure of the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to require smoke detection and fire suppression systems in class D cargo compartments.
Contributing to the accident, the NTSB wrote, was "ValuJet's failure to ensure that both ValuJet and contract maintenance facility employees were aware of the carrier's "no-carry" hazardous materials policy and had received appropriate hazardous materials training."
Gallagher is best known today as the CEO and Chairman of Allegiant Travel Company, and its major subsidiary, Allegiant Air. Gallagher was the major creditor of the then small, Fresno-based scheduled airline in 2000 when it declared bankruptcy. He gained control of the airline as a result of the bankruptcy and later became CEO and Chairman. Under his leadership, the airline changed headquarters to Las Vegas and eventually evolved a unique business model of flying older large commercial aircraft from small cities around the US to large leisure destinations (initially Las Vegas, later Orlando, Phoenix, St Petersburg, Fort Lauderdale and other cities).
In May 2016, the FAA confirmed that Allegiant was under investigation for possible safety violations, drawing comparisons to the ValuJet crash twenty years earlier.
Gallagher has been involved in many other entrepreneurial activities, not all of them aviation-related. For instance, in between his time at ValuJet and Allegiant, he founded and had leadership positions at Mpower Communications, a CLEC that IPOd in 1998.
Gallagher remains a substantial shareholder of Allegiant. The Allegiant proxy statement filed in April 2015 indicates he is a 21.3% shareholder, the single largest shareholder of record. The same document indicates a substantial number of related party transactions between Allegiant and Gallagher, relating to Gallagher's ownership participation in Allegiant's former headquarters, sponsorship by Allegiant of the racing activities of Gallagher's son, payments by Allegiant, through a subsidiary, to a TV production company partially owned by Gallagher and payments by Allegiant to a corporate training firm controlled by Gallagher.
He is the 2015 recipient of the Tony Jannus Award for distinguished achievement in commercial air transportation.
Philanthropic
Gallagher has made at least two prominent donations to the UC Davis Graduate School of Management. The first was for an endowed chair in the name of he and his wife, the second was a $10mm donation which prompted the school to name its new building the Maurice J. Gallagher, Jr. Hall. In 2011, Gallagher gave the commencement address for the UC Davis business school.
Motorsports
Outside of airlines, he is also known for owning GMS Racing, an American professional NASCAR team that currently races in Xfinity Series and Camping World Truck Series. Originally built in order to further extend his son Spencer's racing career in ARCA, it has since becoming one of the major teams in Truck Series and Chevrolet's current flagship Truck team, with driver Johnny Sauter winning the Truck Series championship for GMS in 2016.
Personal life
Gallagher is an alumnus of the University of California, Davis and received his MBA from the University of California, Berkeley. Gallagher is married. His wife's name is Marcia. Maury and Marcia Gallagher have two children, one of whom, Spencer Gallagher is currently a race car driver.