US regional airline Trans States Airlines has announced that it will cease operations nine months earlier than previously planned.
This decision was made after its only customer, United Airlines, decided that it will not need the additional capacity from Trans States because of significant Coronavirus-related reductions throughout its schedule.
Initially, it was stated that the regional carrier would shut down at the end of 2020 when United Airlines announced changes to its United Express feeder services back in February.
To reduce operating costs at United it was decided that all of Trans States Embraer ERJ-145 would be transferred to United subsidiary ExpressJet, which would then transfer all of its Embraer E175 jets to SkyWest Airlines. In addition to losing its only mainline customer, Trans States Airlines has also struggled to attract new pilots and other staff to keep the airline running as the United States are headed into a pilot shortage with many older pilots retiring in the next few years but not enough young pilots filling in the gaps left by retirements.
Trans States Airlines was originally founded in 1982 and has operated regional services for USAir, Trans World Airlines, American Airlines, Alaska Airlines, Air Midwest and United Airlines. Its fleet consists of 42 Embraer ERJ-145 which it exclusively operates for United Express.
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Jan-Hendrik is an aviation enthusiast from Germany, loves to travel the world and fly on as many aircraft as possible. His first flight was with a Condor 757 to Spain and has been interested in aviation ever since. His fields of expertise are aircraft accidents and passenger experience (PaxEx).
