America West Airlines, which was once known as one of the top ten carrier services in United States, has today ceased to operate and has merged with US Airways Groups. What began in 1981 as a phenomenal success story with its bases in Phoenix, Arizona and Las Vegas, Nevada. The two international airports the airlines worked from are Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport and McCarran International Airport. Offering low cost airfares to as many as 100 destinations in the countries of US, Canada and Mexico. The history of the America West Airlines began with humble beginnings with merely three aircraft models, serving the Phoenix base. However, the company faced several challenges, which they had to ultimately succumb to. The American West Holdings Corporation announced the shutting down of the America West Airlines in 2005, which was finally realized in the year 2007. The 24-year history came to an end with the merging of the US Airways Groups, which was based in Virginia, and the America West Airlines.
| The America West Airlines began in an unique way, introducing for the first time, the cross utilization, in which the employees were used for different range of functions. Thus, for instance, the flight attendants were trained to be gate agents as well. What began with merely 3 aircrafts in 1983 soon grew to 11 aircrafts flying to 13 city destinations. Besides offering low cost services, they also offered full services within the flight. Soon the company introduced the policy in which the new employees had to invest 20 per cent of their salaries towards the company stocks.
|
|
Soon it added long distance destinations such as Nagoya in Japan and Hawaii. However, the airlines continued to face losses, as there were several considerations such as increasing fuel costs in the Gulf region, introduction of unions amidst the staff and the failure of long distance costs such as Nagoya route. Finally, the company was forced to declare bankruptcy, operating under such conditions for four years from 1991 to 1994.
The bankruptcy led to much reorganization within the organization, with shared code agreements with airlines such as Mesa Airlines and Continental Airlines. In 2003 however, the Port Columbus International Airport center was forced to shut down, leading to a dramatic fall in the number of scheduled fights for the day. From the year 2006, the America West Airlines began to be branded as US Airways, with gradual introduction of several changes such as change in the club names, repainting of the aircraft, consolidation of the gates and the ticket counters of both the airlines and with the merge of certificates in the year 2007.
Know more about other major US airlines at United States.
|
