Ryan International Airlines

Ryan International Airlines, Inc. was an American FAR 121 airline with domestic, flag, and supplemental authority.

Contents

• Ryan international airlines boeing 767 300 landing
• Kickback fraud scheme
• Fleet
• References

Based in Rockford, Illinois, the US Postal Service was once the airline's main customer, flying Boeing 727 aircraft on scheduled mail delivery flights. Ryan International flew non-scheduled charter passenger services for excursion and tour packagers, along with the United States Department of Defense, the United States Department of Justice, and others.

In 1998, the airline began operating flights from California to Hawaii and Mexico, using a pair of McDonnell Douglas DC-10 aircraft and several Airbus A320s on behalf of SunTrips, a vacation package operator in California. The aircraft were operated with Skyservice USA titles and wore the livery of Airtours International Airways, SunTrips' parent company. In 2000, the Skyservice USA titles were replaced with SunTrips titles on the aircraft. Later, Ryan would operate SunTrips flights using Boeing 757 aircraft in Ryan's own livery.

The airline was wholly owned by Ronald Ryan until 2005, when it was purchased by commercial real-estate firm Rubloff Development Group. Ryan operated scheduled passenger flights with Airbus A320 jets for AirTran Airways between Atlanta and the US west coast in 2003 and 2004, after which AirTran began operating the flights themselves with newly delivered Boeing 737-700 aircraft.

Since moving to Rubloff's headquarters in Rockford in 2006, Ryan held a notable number of contracts working mainly for the Department of Defense and the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Until summer 2008, it maintained large operations in Milwaukee, St. Louis, and Boston for Funjet and Apple Vacations. These contracts were terminated following the failure of European carrier Futura International Airways, from which Ryan leased several aircraft to support this operation.

In November 2011, Ryan took delivery their first Airbus A330-300, leased from Virgin Atlantic Airways.

In February 2012, Ryan furloughed Pilots, Flight Attendants and support staff. On March 6, 2012, Ryan filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, citing "unexpected and dramatic reductions in military flying." On April 1, 2012, Ryan lost its bid to continue flying for the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The loss of the DHS contract resulted in the immediate grounding of four McDonnell Douglas MD-80 aircraft to cut costs. On August 1, 2012, Ryan returned its A330-300 to Virgin Atlantic, ending its lease and accepting an older model Airbus A330-200 formerly operated by Atlasjet. Six days later, Jeff Potter, former CEO of Frontier Airlines was hired as the "Chief Restructuring Officer" for Ryan. He is also the President and CEO of aviation consulting firm Boyd Group International. Ryan's President/COO Mike McCabe had left Ryan in May due to cancer surgery. On August 15, 2012, Ryan announced it would be furloughing approximately 30 pilots and 60 flight attendants throughout the coming weeks. Two days later, the majority of flight attendants voted "Yes" to the AFA Contract agreement. At the end of that month, 25 or more management and administrative positions were eliminated. Those positions received same-day notice as the company attempted to further cut costs. Ryan again announced it would be furloughing more pilots and approximately 18 more flight attendants.

On January 11, 2013, Ryan International Airlines' CEO announced that the airline had gone into liquidation. Its staff were dismissed and it ceased operations. On January 31, 2013, charter air-tour operator AstraJet's holding company, AJET Holdings LLC, signed a purchase agreement to buy Ryan International out of bankruptcy with plans to restart the airline under the AstraJet name, operating commercial and charter flights out of Europe to Florida, the Far East, Hawaii, Nevada, and South America. The purchase was completed on March 4, 2013, with AJET taking control of Ryan's Part-121 scheduled-air-carrier license and collective-bargaining agreement with flight attendants and pilots.