While regional airlines often have difficulty turning enough of a profit, many serve isolated communities that depend on the flights they run for both day-to-day needs and connection to the rest of the country.
At the end of August, Anchorage-based carrier Ravn Alaska issued a site update stating that it was “no longer operating flights.”
Flying since 1947 as a charter airline, the carrier had at its peak served 12 destinations. including both larger cities like Fairbanks and more remote destinations such as Homer and St. Paul.
Parent company FLOAT Alaska LLC was able to pull the airline out from a 2020 bankruptcy by significantly downsizing its fleet of Dash 8-100 planes, but the airline’s finances and inability to draw in large numbers of passengers eventually caught up with it.
Air Wisconsin suspends contract to run 12 flights between Ohio and Charlotte
A similar regional airline launched in 1965 in the east-central Wisconsin town of Appleton, Air Wisconsin has over the decades operated as a local feeder carrier for both United (UAL) and American Airlines (AAL) .
Initially designed to connect the eastern part of Wisconsin to Chicago, the regional carrier eventually expanded to more destinations across the Midwest while also operating chartered flights between various regional communities.
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But with a pending acquisition by Florida operator Premier Shuttle Holdings, Air Wisconsin has just alerted the Department of Transportation (DoT) that it no longer plans to launch service out of Mid-Ohio Valley Regional Airport (PKB).
Air Wisconsin had, in August 2025, just secured a contract to run 12 weekly Essential Air Services flights connecting communities on the Ohio-West Virginia border to Charlotte Douglas International Airport (CLT) from October 1.
Sponsored by the federal government, the EAS program is designed to keep airlines operating in remote areas that depend on air service but are not profitable enough to run from a business perspective.
In its regulatory filing, the carrier described the choice to pull out of the contract as a “strategic decision.”
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“Important milestones have not yet been achieved”: Air Wisconsin justifies dropping airport service
“Important milestones have not yet been achieved: the service has not started, final agreements have not been reached and Air Wisconsin has not yet provided the required certifications upon which the Parkersburg EAS award is contingent,” Air Wisconsin wrote in its letter to the DoT.
Air Wisconsin also argues in the letter that pulling out of PKB does not yet classify as violating the service contract.
Speculation on who will get the contract now currently lands on Contour Airlines, as the Tennessee-based carrier has already been running weekly 30-seat flights between Parkersburg and Charlotte since 2024.
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In the same week, Air Wisconsin also told regulators that it sent layoff notices to 252 of its employees working between Appleton and Milwaukee. The airline had already laid off over 513 employees last February, bringing the total number of jobs it cut to just under 800.
In the letter to the U.S. Department of Workplace Development, Air Wisconsin said that it will “continue to pursue opportunities in aircraft, engine, and parts sales and leasing,” while continuing to “employ certain Air Wisconsin employees to support its operation.”
The carrier neither publicly revealed which positions have been cut nor identified jobs for which it will continue hiring when its acquisition by Premier Shuttle Holdings is complete.
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