Air Midwest shuts down

Air Midwest, a subsidiary of Mesa Air Group that serves a number of small cities with 19-seat Beech 1900D aircraft, announced that it will discontinue all operations due to “record high fuel prices, insufficient demand and a difficult operating environment.” It is not related to Midwest Airlines. The little airline had been trying to get by with the help of Essential Air Service subsidies from the federal government, but even that was not enough to keep it out of the red “for the last several years,” said Mesa Air Group CEO Jonathan Orenstein. The company released the following schedule for the termination of Air Midwest services: On May 23 it will end eastern U.S. operations, at Lewisburg, W. Va.; DuBois, Pa.; Franklin, Pa.; and Athens, Ga. Effective May 31, Air Midwest will stop flying at Ely, Nev.; Merced and Visalia, Calif.; Prescott and Kingman, Ariz.; and Farmington, N.NM. And on June 30, the airline will end service at Columbia, Joplin and Kirksville, Mo.; Grand Island and McCook, Neb.; and Little Rock, Ark.