Great Plains Airlines was a regional airline headquartered in
Tulsa
Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with ...
,
Oklahoma.
History
The airline was founded by Jack Knight and Jim Swartz to give
Oklahoma City
Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, it ranks 20th among United States cities in population, a ...
and Tulsa travelers affordable quality non-stop service to a number of destinations, ultimately with direct flights to heavily traveled business destinations on the east and west coasts.
The airline was founded in 2001 with a mix of tax credits and government loans totaling $27 million and expanded rapidly, filing with the Air Transportation Stabilization Board for a guarantee of $17 million from a $25 million loan, though this was rejected, as the Board deemed the airline's business plan to be too risky.
To assist in starting the airline, an air operator's certificate
An air operator's certificate (AOC) is the approval granted by a civil aviation authority (CAA) to an aircraft operator to allow it to use aircraft for commercial purposes. This requires the operator to have personnel, assets, and system in plac ...
was purchased from Ozark Airlines, an airline not related to the original Ozark Airlines
Ozark Air Lines was an airline that operated in the United States from 1950 until 1986 when it was purchased by Trans World Airlines (TWA). In 2001, TWA was merged into American Airlines. A smaller regional airline that used the Ozark name (a ...
, but a small regional airline operating Dornier 328JET
The Fairchild-Dornier 328JET is a commuter airliner, based upon the turboprop-powered Dornier 328, developed by the German aircraft manufacturer Dornier Luftfahrt GmbH. It would be the last Dornier-designed aircraft to reach production before ...
s. The airline also took over operation of Ozark's two aircraft, and later expanded the fleet to five aircraft including a Dornier 328
The Dornier 328 is a turboprop-powered commuter airliner. Initially produced by Dornier Luftfahrt GmbH, the firm was acquired in 1996 by Fairchild Aircraft. The resulting firm, named Fairchild-Dornier, manufactured the 328 family in Oberpfaffen ...
turboprop by the time of the airline's closure.
In 2002 Great Plains joined with commuter airline Rio Grande Air to provide a feeder network from Albuquerque to the smaller New Mexico cities of Alamogordo and Taos as well as to Durango, Colorado. Rio Grande Air adopted Great Plains "ZO" code on their flights.
The airline filed for bankruptcy and ceased operations in 2004 after attempts to secure additional financing and investments were unsuccessful. After it ceased operations, all five of the company's aircraft were repossessed by creditors and all other property belonging to the airline was auctioned off. The airline also sold its tax credits to a third party for $15 million, but was ultimately unable to repay $7.1 million of a December 2000 loan arranged by local government agencies, triggering a lengthy dispute between the Tulsa Airport Improvement Trust (TAIT), the Tulsa Industrial Authority (TIA), the Bank of Oklahoma
BOK Financial Corporation — pronounced as letters, "B-O-K" — is a financial services holding company headquartered in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Offering a full complement of retail and commercial banking products and services across the American Midw ...
and the city of Tulsa. TAIT had guaranteed the loan by agreeing to buy the mortgaged Air Force Plant No. 3 adjacent to Tulsa International Airport
Tulsa International Airport is a civil-military airport five miles (8 km) northeast of downtown Tulsa, in Tulsa County, Oklahoma, United States. It was named Tulsa Municipal Airport when the city acquired it in 1929;[Federal Aviation Administration
The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) is the largest transportation agency of the U.S. government and regulates all aspects of civil aviation in the country as well as over surrounding international waters. Its powers include air traffic ...]
policies prohibiting an airport authority from subsidizing a particular airline, and TAIT was sued by the TIA after declining to buy the plant for this reason. After a 2011 settlement attempt using city of Tulsa funds was rejected as illegal by the Oklahoma Supreme Court, the dispute was finally settled in August 2015 for $1.69 million.
The airline had several signature items, including Krispy Kreme
Krispy Kreme, Inc. (previously Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, Inc.) is an American multinational doughnut company and coffeehouse chain.
Krispy Kreme was founded by Vernon Rudolph (1915–1973), who bought a yeast-raised recipe from a New Orleans c ...
donuts and Arby's
Arby's is an American fast food sandwich restaurant chain with more than 3,300 restaurants system wide and third in terms of revenue. In October 2017, ''Food & Wine'' called Arby's "America's second largest sandwich chain (after Subway)".
Arby ...
sandwiches served on board.
Destinations
* Albuquerque, New Mexico
* Austin, Texas
Austin is the capital city of the U.S. state of Texas, as well as the seat and largest city of Travis County, with portions extending into Hays and Williamson counties. Incorporated on December 27, 1839, it is the 11th-most-populous city ...
* Chicago, Illinois (Midway)
* Colorado Springs, Colorado[
]
* Nashville, Tennessee
Nashville is the capital city of the U.S. state of Tennessee and the seat of Davidson County. With a population of 689,447 at the 2020 U.S. census, Nashville is the most populous city in the state, 21st most-populous city in the U.S., and ...
* Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
Oklahoma City (), officially the City of Oklahoma City, and often shortened to OKC, is the capital and largest city of the U.S. state of Oklahoma. The county seat of Oklahoma County, it ranks 20th among United States cities in population, and ...
* St. Louis, Missouri
St. Louis () is the second-largest city in Missouri, United States. It sits near the confluence of the Mississippi and the Missouri Rivers. In 2020, the city proper had a population of 301,578, while the bi-state metropolitan area, which e ...
* Tulsa, Oklahoma
Tulsa () is the second-largest city in the state of Oklahoma and 47th-most populous city in the United States. The population was 413,066 as of the 2020 census. It is the principal municipality of the Tulsa Metropolitan Area, a region with ...
* Washington, DC (Dulles)
Code Share Destinations with Rio Grande Air
* Alamogordo, New Mexico
* Durango, Colorado
* Taos, New Mexico
Taos is a town in Taos County in the north-central region of New Mexico in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains. Initially founded in 1615, it was intermittently occupied until its formal establishment in 1795 by Nuevo México Governor Fernando Ch ...
Fleet
* Fairchild Dornier 328JET
The Fairchild-Dornier 328JET is a commuter airliner, based upon the turboprop-powered Dornier 328, developed by the German aircraft manufacturer Dornier Luftfahrt GmbH. It would be the last Dornier-designed aircraft to reach production before ...
s
* Fairchild-Dornier 328
The Dornier 328 is a turboprop-powered commuter airliner. Initially produced by Dornier Luftfahrt GmbH, the firm was acquired in 1996 by Fairchild Aircraft. The resulting firm, named Fairchild-Dornier, manufactured the 328 family in Oberpfaffen ...
turboprops
See also
* List of defunct airlines of the United States
A ''list'' is any set of items in a row. List or lists may also refer to:
People
* List (surname)
Organizations
* List College, an undergraduate division of the Jewish Theological Seminary of America
* SC Germania List, German rugby unio ...
References
{{Portal bar, Companies, Aviation
Defunct airlines of the United States
Airlines established in 2001
Airlines disestablished in 2004
Companies based in Tulsa, Oklahoma
Defunct companies based in Oklahoma
2001 establishments in the United States