https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/onejet-enters-agreement-to-acquire-ultimate-jetcharters-300640138.html

https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/flights/todayinthesky/2018/05/01/onejet-buy-ultimate-jet-charters-continues-expand/568261002/


Ultimate JetCharters to be integrated into OneJet's scheduled network. Ultimate Air Shuttle and its scheduled network to remain separate for now.

Schedule changes, upgauges, and new seasonal destinations to be announced in May.

Onejet has been a lot of talk over the recent years. They need to get this thing going NOW. The president mentions 1500 possible point to point routes . They have had very few success up 'til this point ,shifting with the wind on their hub and routes!.

Here is the combined route map:


There is certainly a lot of room for growth, especially from the PIT and LUK/(CVG) bases. Ultimate had a few E-Jets on order, but only ever took one of them. I will be interested to see if they try to get more aircraft with OneJet's backing. They were interested in starting LUK-TEB/PDK/MEM/BNA, but could never start the routes without more aircraft.

If the Ultimate folks get to run the operation, the outcome should be good. Rising fuel prices, of course, are not good news for 30-seaters.

masseybrown wrote:

If the Ultimate folks get to run the operation, the outcome should be good. Rising fuel prices, of course, are not good news for 30-seaters.

Agreed, but usually that is not the case with acquisitions. OneJet has ambitious growth plans and it appears that there's a lot of money backing it up.

I'm sad to see Ultimate Air Shuttle name brand go. It is a nice little operation with excellent service and a loyal fan base. But in order to survive in this cutthroat business you need a lot of money to back you up. I'm sure the owners realized the behemoth task that lay ahead to grow the business and got offered a sweet deal by OneJet.

For those of you that haven't flown private yet, I highly suggest you try it - you will not regret it! It's a very different experience from flying commercial.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z0DlpPYDfQE

LatinPlane wrote:

Agreed, but usually that is not the case with acquisitions. OneJet has ambitious growth plans and it appears that there's a lot of money backing it up.

Let Rohr's OneJet people do the CEO stuff. Let Ultimate folks do the COO stuff.

cvgComair wrote:

Here is the combined route map:


There is certainly a lot of room for growth, especially from the PIT and LUK/(CVG) bases. Ultimate had a few E-Jets on order, but only ever took one of them. I will be interested to see if they try to get more aircraft with OneJet's backing. They were interested in starting LUK-TEB/PDK/MEM/BNA, but could never start the routes without more aircraft.

Thanks for the map. I've been thinking about why they would keep the scheduled Ultimate Air Shuttle network separate from OneJet. Pure speculation on my part but it probably has to do with different operating requirements of using FBO's at general aviation airports vs that of sterile areas of passenger terminals at FAR Part 139 airports (commercial service airports). But once they get things more integrated I would expect the combined company to follow the OneJet model of using main airports; and as such the entire LUK operation could disappear or be shifted to CVG. The problem of shifting to CVG is that with the exception of Cleveland the current markets served from LUK are already served from CVG on other airlines. OneJet tries to avoid this, as you can see from the PIT network. But I can see CVG-PIT returning. We'll see what happens.

I just don't get how those airlines make any money. Their aircraft seem to spend a lot of time on the ground.

Cincinnati to Atlanta 7:00am 8:05am
Atlanta to Cincinnati 4:00pm 5:05pm

Cincinnati to Charlotte 6:25am 7:30am
Charlotte to Cincinnati 4:45pm 5:51pm

Unless maybe they charter them during the downtime.

Could this bring back MKE-OMA possibly?

lavalampluva wrote:

I just don't get how those airlines make any money. Their aircraft seem to spend a lot of time on the ground.

Cincinnati to Atlanta 7:00am 8:05am
Atlanta to Cincinnati 4:00pm 5:05pm

Cincinnati to Charlotte 6:25am 7:30am
Charlotte to Cincinnati 4:45pm 5:51pm

Unless maybe they charter them during the downtime.

To me it seems like they are keeping them on the ground for two reasons:

1. to offer a convenient schedule for business passengers.
2. in the future to add an extra rotation before heading back to Cincinnati.

lavalampluva wrote:

I just don't get how those airlines make any money. Their aircraft seem to spend a lot of time on the ground.

Cincinnati to Atlanta 7:00am 8:05am
Atlanta to Cincinnati 4:00pm 5:05pm

Cincinnati to Charlotte 6:25am 7:30am
Charlotte to Cincinnati 4:45pm 5:51pm

Unless maybe they charter them during the downtime.

Ultimate charters during the off time, so the planes are not on the ground that whole time.

Definitely an interesting move by OneJet. A lot of their problems in the last year or so have been access to aircraft, and more recently the (apparent?) realization that 7-seat business jets are too small to work well in the markets they target. In addition to being a pretty similar line of business, acquiring Ultimate gets them aircraft they need to run a better operation.

Here's some comparison:

Flights per weekday
32 OneJet
12 Ultimate

Segments per scheduled aircraft per weekday
6.4 OneJet
3.0 Ultimate

Aircraft “lines of flying” per weekday
5 OneJet
4 Ultimate

Weekday hours of utilization per aircraft in scheduled service:
8.6 OneJet
3.2 Ultimate

Aircraft surplus / shortage compared to planned scheduled service
-2 OneJet: “Full” schedule needed 7 aircraft, only 5 lines of flying operate currently
+6 Ultimate: They have about 10 aircraft and 4 lines of flying

Aircraft availability led OneJet to suspend or reduce several routes and may be why they have not yet made good on announced PIT-MEM-MCI flights. Ultimate can probably put a few additional aircraft into service for OneJet pretty quickly, allowing them to resume suspended service and/or add new routes.

The acquisition definitely brings up some points of question:

1. Ultimate flies aircraft, where OneJet is a virtual airline which contracts with Contour to fly for them. Will the Contour relationship eventually go away and OneJet be operated fully by aircraft operated by Ultimate? OneJet's aircraft availability issues would seem to land a Contour's doorstep. But I have no way of knowing if Contour has been an exemplary partner and the aircraft issues came from unavoidable circumstances and difficult decisions jointly made, or if Contour has fallen well short of meeting OneJet's expectations. One wonders if maybe Contour will continue to be a lift vendor for the intermediate future but eventually Ultimate does all the flying sold as OneJet.

2. Ultimate's business model has been to serve city pairs with lots of big-airline competitor flights, but serve the FBO at (usually) smaller airports with minimal security. OneJet flies like a full-service carrier at the main terminal of the big airport. The limitation of Ultimate's business plan is that its appeal is virtually limited to Cincinnati-originating business travelers. That means the aircraft sit all day at the outstation and fly back to Cincinnati in the late afternoon because there's no market to do anything else. The once-per-day schedule means if they would move to the main airport passenger terminal a la OneJet they'd have no market whatsoever. And like any RJ flying it's rough to compete against low-fare carriers. The new presence of Southwest on CVG-MDW has made LUK-MDW a much tougher row to hoe for Ultimate. The big exception with Ultimate is LUK-BKL. With nobody flying between Cincinnati and Cleveland they pull passengers solidly from both ends, and can run 2x/day instead of stranding an aircraft in Cleveland all day. This route would probably work fine if they continued to operate with minimal security at LUK and BKL or from the passenger terminal at CVG and CLE. Having to deal with security at CVG an CLE would make flying a notch less convenient but likely not prohibitively slow. Frequent flyers with carry-on bags don't show up 2 hours early at CVG or CLE. because of TSA worries. It will be interesting to see if over time Ultimate moved more toward OneJet's model and what that does for the LUK network.

Blerg wrote:

lavalampluva wrote:

I just don't get how those airlines make any money. Their aircraft seem to spend a lot of time on the ground.

Cincinnati to Atlanta 7:00am 8:05am
Atlanta to Cincinnati 4:00pm 5:05pm

Cincinnati to Charlotte 6:25am 7:30am
Charlotte to Cincinnati 4:45pm 5:51pm

Unless maybe they charter them during the downtime.

To me it seems like they are keeping them on the ground for two reasons:

1. to offer a convenient schedule for business passengers.
2. in the future to add an extra rotation before heading back to Cincinnati.

They have tried doing something scheduled mid-day with those aircraft a few times but the market didn't seem to be there. What they do works for Cincinnati-originating traffic because the flight times are business-perfect, business travelers in Cincinnati have grown to at least be aware of Ultimate, and LUK is not an unknown entity. But from the outstation (Chicago, metro NY, etc.) the airline is unknown, the airport (or the FBO of a large airport) is an unknown,and the schedule is not so good for a day trip to Cincinnati (mid-morning outbound, midafternoon return). Chicago, Charlotte, Atlanta and New York all have plenty of nonstops to CVG that passengers originating in those markets use. Certainly tere are times when these Ultimate aircraft do find some charter work to do mid-day but I don't think that's the rule. It's not enough time to do a useful business day-trip originating in Chicago, Charlotte, etc.

If executed correctly, this may be one of the few times a support an airline merger as it will truly make them a more viable competitor.

flyPIT wrote:

cvgComair wrote:

Here is the combined route map:


There is certainly a lot of room for growth, especially from the PIT and LUK/(CVG) bases. Ultimate had a few E-Jets on order, but only ever took one of them. I will be interested to see if they try to get more aircraft with OneJet's backing. They were interested in starting LUK-TEB/PDK/MEM/BNA, but could never start the routes without more aircraft.

Thanks for the map. I've been thinking about why they would keep the scheduled Ultimate Air Shuttle network separate from OneJet. Pure speculation on my part but it probably has to do with different operating requirements of using FBO's at general aviation airports vs that of sterile areas of passenger terminals at FAR Part 139 airports (commercial service airports). But once they get things more integrated I would expect the combined company to follow the OneJet model of using main airports; and as such the entire LUK operation could disappear or be shifted to CVG. The problem of shifting to CVG is that with the exception of Cleveland the current markets served from LUK are already served from CVG on other airlines. OneJet tries to avoid this, as you can see from the PIT network. But I can see CVG-PIT returning. We'll see what happens.

According to both CEO's, OneJet will operate CVG-PIT and Ultimate will continue its operations at CVG, though both airlines will be adding flights (both frequency and destinations) to both airports soon. They did mention Nashville as one of the possible destinations. The CEO of Ultimate said that eventually they will shift over to CVG, though no timeframe was given. However, it sounds like CVG/LUK is going to be a key base in the newly merged airline.

Also, if OneJet/Ultimate Air Shuttle are nervous from the B6/JetSuite interlining agreement, I wonder what the chance of J1/UE trying to interline with another mainline carrier are? I was thinking DL would be a perfect match due to their desire to expand PTP flying, plus they have a hub at CVG and are really strong at PIT. That could make for a very interesting partnership, that I think could be very successful.

cvgComair wrote:

flyPIT wrote:

cvgComair wrote:

Here is the combined route map:


There is certainly a lot of room for growth, especially from the PIT and LUK/(CVG) bases. Ultimate had a few E-Jets on order, but only ever took one of them. I will be interested to see if they try to get more aircraft with OneJet's backing. They were interested in starting LUK-TEB/PDK/MEM/BNA, but could never start the routes without more aircraft.

Thanks for the map. I've been thinking about why they would keep the scheduled Ultimate Air Shuttle network separate from OneJet. Pure speculation on my part but it probably has to do with different operating requirements of using FBO's at general aviation airports vs that of sterile areas of passenger terminals at FAR Part 139 airports (commercial service airports). But once they get things more integrated I would expect the combined company to follow the OneJet model of using main airports; and as such the entire LUK operation could disappear or be shifted to CVG. The problem of shifting to CVG is that with the exception of Cleveland the current markets served from LUK are already served from CVG on other airlines. OneJet tries to avoid this, as you can see from the PIT network. But I can see CVG-PIT returning. We'll see what happens.

According to both CEO's, OneJet will operate CVG-PIT and Ultimate will continue its operations at CVG, though both airlines will be adding flights (both frequency and destinations) to both airports soon. They did mention Nashville as one of the possible destinations. The CEO of Ultimate said that eventually they will shift over to CVG, though no timeframe was given. However, it sounds like CVG/LUK is going to be a key base in the newly merged airline.

I wonder if CVG-PIT will stick this time, and if they re-enter BNA, will it stick there as well? OneJet has tried BNA twice already.

I'm surprised OneJet didn't go after Southern Airways Express. OneJet absorbing that would be huge.

According to http://www.cleveland.com/travel/index.s ... tle_t.html, Ultimate is going to expand its flights out of both Cincinnati and Cleveland. They said that 4 new flight crews have already been hired, so I would assume the Cincy flights will come very soon, while the Cleveland flights should be announced by the end of the year.

Someone on the IND Facebook group who works at the OneJet ramp said that they also have big plans for IND later on this year. He said that three months ago, so things are starting to add up here.

I think there is really no reason they cannot make CVG/IND/PIT/CLE all bases, these are cities which were once major hubs/focus cities and have lost a lot of these smaller business routes. As the CEO said, there are 1500 routes in the US just like they operate currently. Ultimate Air Shuttle was the modern pioneer back into this market and OneJet/JetSuiteX are picking up the strategy very well. I think we will continue to see great things from them and I bet the partnership will greatly accelerate this process.

I was just on their website and noticed that they are introducing One Jet Plus where they offer 4' of extra legroom, free snacks and both alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, free wifi ...

What kind of product do they offer now to those flying economy? Is it just a drink and a snack or is it buy on board?

I really like them as much as I like Silver. I hope both airlines eventually make it.

By the way, is OneJet profitable?

Blerg wrote:

I was just on their website and noticed that they are introducing One Jet Plus where they offer 4' of extra legroom, free snacks and both alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, free wifi ...

What kind of product do they offer now to those flying economy? Is it just a drink and a snack or is it buy on board?

OneJet has flown small business jets since their start so there's no onboard service, though they did get wi-fi onboard when they upgraded there fleet.

When they added the E135 in February that brought about OneJet Plus service. By virtue of being limited to 30 seats and needing a flight attendant there's more legroom and onboard service.

Blerg wrote:

By the way, is OneJet profitable?

Nobody knows at least not externally. They've received outside investment a couple of times including from groups in Pittsburgh and Milwaukee. But it's hard to to know if that money has helped them cover losses or helped them to continue to grow including now buying Ultimate.

knope2001 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

I was just on their website and noticed that they are introducing One Jet Plus where they offer 4' of extra legroom, free snacks and both alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, free wifi ...

What kind of product do they offer now to those flying economy? Is it just a drink and a snack or is it buy on board?

OneJet has flown small business jets since their start so there's no onboard service, though they did get wi-fi onboard when they upgraded there fleet.

When they added the E135 in February that brought about OneJet Plus service. By virtue of being limited to 30 seats and needing a flight attendant there's more legroom and onboard service.

Ultimate Air Shuttle has an onboard service with a small breakfast for the morning flights, and a meat/cheese plate plus snacks for evening flights. I will be interested to see if OneJet copies that service on its larger jets.

All the seats are the same class, so there is no economy cabin.

knope2001 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

I was just on their website and noticed that they are introducing One Jet Plus where they offer 4' of extra legroom, free snacks and both alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages, free wifi ...

What kind of product do they offer now to those flying economy? Is it just a drink and a snack or is it buy on board?

OneJet has flown small business jets since their start so there's no onboard service, though they did get wi-fi onboard when they upgraded there fleet.

When they added the E135 in February that brought about OneJet Plus service. By virtue of being limited to 30 seats and needing a flight attendant there's more legroom and onboard service.

Blerg wrote:

By the way, is OneJet profitable?

Nobody knows at least not externally. They've received outside investment a couple of times including from groups in Pittsburgh and Milwaukee. But it's hard to to know if that money has helped them cover losses or helped them to continue to grow including now buying Ultimate.

I’m curious, what is the limiting factor that keeps them at 30 seats or less? Doesn’t Via Air operate public charters with 50 seats?

lavalampluva wrote:

I just don't get how those airlines make any money. Their aircraft seem to spend a lot of time on the ground.
Unless maybe they charter them during the downtime.

Ultimate charges relatively high fares and acquired the Dorniers at bargain prices when nobody wanted them. Ultimate is reportedly profitable, although I'm not sure well-capitalized OneJet is.

masseybrown wrote:

Ultimate is reportedly profitable, although I'm not sure well-capitalized OneJet is.

"A spokeswoman for OneJet said the carrier is profitable, but doesn't disclose its financial results because it is privately held."
http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/14/news/onejet-new-airlines/index.html


"Starting last month, our Pittsburgh base went profitable, so all our routes out there are profitable now."
http://www.aviationpros.com/article/12260089/onejet-business-soars-in-new-markets

I read they discontinued Milwaukee to Omaha. Is it because of low demand or fleet shortage? What's the reason for even considering such a city pair? It would be only their third destination out of Milwaukee.

ViaAir operates their flights as a normal scheduled Part 121, not a public charter.

MKE-OMA was scrapped by OneJet for a number of reasons, the biggest of which was the desire to eliminate the MKE crew/aircraft base. One of the reasons MKE-OMA was considered initially was that it was flown by both YX and the OO-operated FL codeshare operation at various times and had fairly good loads when it was operated.

UJC's catering service would be a nice touch on PIT-MCI and PIT-PBI. It's probably unnecessary on ALB-BUF due to the short stage length and is obviously not possible on the Bizjet flights because no FA.

drdisque wrote:

MKE-OMA was scrapped by OneJet for a number of reasons, the biggest of which was the desire to eliminate the MKE crew/aircraft base.

There was one aircraft based on Milwaukee each night which ran to Columbus and Omaha. Now there's still one aircraft but it only goes to Columbus. Is there a change I'm missing?

Perhaps the schedule didn't work for the same aircraft to operate both routes, due to the time change going to Columbus. If the aircraft went to Columbus first, then perhaps the return from Omaha ended up leaving too late. If it went to Omaha first then definitely the morning return from Columbus to Milwaukee would have been way too late. I don't know what the schedule was, but it probably resulted in a a schedule where flying two turns twice a day with the same aircraft didn't result in a viable schedule. OMA was likely the weaker route, so it was dropped, as CMH also has the potential of possibly supporting a PIT flight while OMA almost definitely doesn't.

There was some preliminary talk of opening a base at CMH if things went well, too. I wonder if that changes here.

flyPIT wrote:

"A spokeswoman for OneJet said the carrier is profitable, but doesn't disclose its financial results because it is privately held."
http://money.cnn.com/2018/02/14/news/onejet-new-airlines/index.html


"Starting last month, our Pittsburgh base went profitable, so all our routes out there are profitable now."
http://www.aviationpros.com/article/12260089/onejet-business-soars-in-new-markets

Thanks for the citations, flyPIT. I wonder if the E135s changed anything. I wish them well; they are filling a real need.

It says online that this April they received one E145, I guess it's based in Pittsburgh. It is interesting that they are already introducing larger aircraft. I wonder if eventually, as they become more popular, they might switch to something like E70 or E75.

I would really love for them to succeed. Would be great to have a true regional carrier.

The E-145s are flying PIT-MCI, PIT-PBI, and ALB-BUF.

drdisque wrote:

The E-145s are flying PIT-MCI, PIT-PBI, and ALB-BUF.

Great, thank you.

They announced MEM-PIT and MEM-MCI for March 2018 and they never started them. I don't think they even offered them for sale. What happened there?

I hope we keep this thread going instead of burying OneJet news in the airport threads. That said, I have no news.

rj777 wrote:

Could this bring back MKE-OMA possibly?

This will not come back. It wasn't killed because of aircraft availability. The loads were bad.

Blerg wrote:

It says online that this April they received one E145, I guess it's based in Pittsburgh. It is interesting that they are already introducing larger aircraft. I wonder if eventually, as they become more popular, they might switch to something like E70 or E75.

I would really love for them to succeed. Would be great to have a true regional carrier.

Larger is still restricted to 30 seats. I don't think there is any interest in obtaining DOT authority or FAA 121 certification.

MO11 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

It says online that this April they received one E145, I guess it's based in Pittsburgh. It is interesting that they are already introducing larger aircraft. I wonder if eventually, as they become more popular, they might switch to something like E70 or E75.

I would really love for them to succeed. Would be great to have a true regional carrier.

Larger is still restricted to 30 seats. I don't think there is any interest in obtaining DOT authority or FAA 121 certification.

I am not from the US nor am I familiar with this so could you clarify please? Do they get subsidies for maximum 30 seats?

Blerg wrote:

MO11 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

It says online that this April they received one E145, I guess it's based in Pittsburgh. It is interesting that they are already introducing larger aircraft. I wonder if eventually, as they become more popular, they might switch to something like E70 or E75.

I would really love for them to succeed. Would be great to have a true regional carrier.

Larger is still restricted to 30 seats. I don't think there is any interest in obtaining DOT authority or FAA 121 certification.

I am not from the US nor am I familiar with this so could you clarify please? Do they get subsidies for maximum 30 seats?

It's a little complicated. If you operate scheduled passenger flights with aircraft that have more than 9 passenger seats, you must operate your flights to the highest FAA safety standards (FAR 121). If the aircraft requires two pilots, then both pilots need the highest lever of pilot certificate (Airline Transport Pilot), which means the first officer must have at least 1500 flying hours. This has not always been the case, and has recently been a hardship on some regional carriers.

If you operate charter flights with airplanes with 30 seats or less, you may operate under the less restrictive FAR 135.

In addition, if you are operating scheduled flights between any two points more than 4 times per week, you need to get approval from the DOT, which will look at your financial situation and managerial competence.

One Jet operates its flights as public charters. The charters just happen to go at the same time every day. One Jet does not have DOT authority, it just needs to file a charter prospectus with the DOT. One Jet charters airplanes from Contour. Since its flights are charters, anything with 30-seats or less can be operated under FAR 135. This is good since Contour doesn't have a 121 certificate. But it does have FAR 135 commuter authority and DOT authority to operate scheduled services, which is what it needs.

Actually OneJet only has to file a charter prospectus for their ERJ flights. Their Beechjet flights count as Commuter flights since they have 9 seats or fewer and they can fly them as much as they want.

Ultimate Jet Charters also has the same authorities as Contour on their certificate, which is why many are speculating that at least the RJ flights may move over to them (especially because they already have the ERJ on their certificate). However, Contour has built a pretty solid ERJ maintenance program with former Expressjet people they've hired, so there may be an arrangement where Contour continues to fly the Beechjet flights (I had actually heard they're looking at replacing the Beechjets with something more modern, but we'll call them Beechjet flights for now), UJC flies the ERJ flights and all the ERJ maintenance is contracted to Contour.

What equipment operates PBI-PIT?

drdisque wrote:

Actually OneJet only has to file a charter prospectus for their ERJ flights. Their Beechjet flights count as Commuter flights since they have 9 seats or fewer and they can fly them as much as they want.

Nope. "Commuter Air Carrier" in DOT terms is defined as 60 seats or less. If you fly all CRJ 200s you can operate as a commuter air carrier. If you add CRJ-700s, you need a new certificate. The "Air Taxi" rule only applies if you run less than 5 trips/week between two points. One Jet has been Part 380 (public charter) all along.

One Jet was supposed to get CJ4s to replace the Beechjets, not sure if that is still going.

727LOVER wrote:

What equipment operates PBI-PIT?

ERJ.

MO11 wrote:

Blerg wrote:

MO11 wrote:

Larger is still restricted to 30 seats. I don't think there is any interest in obtaining DOT authority or FAA 121 certification.

I am not from the US nor am I familiar with this so could you clarify please? Do they get subsidies for maximum 30 seats?

It's a little complicated. If you operate scheduled passenger flights with aircraft that have more than 9 passenger seats, you must operate your flights to the highest FAA safety standards (FAR 121). If the aircraft requires two pilots, then both pilots need the highest lever of pilot certificate (Airline Transport Pilot), which means the first officer must have at least 1500 flying hours. This has not always been the case, and has recently been a hardship on some regional carriers.

If you operate charter flights with airplanes with 30 seats or less, you may operate under the less restrictive FAR 135.

In addition, if you are operating scheduled flights between any two points more than 4 times per week, you need to get approval from the DOT, which will look at your financial situation and managerial competence.

One Jet operates its flights as public charters. The charters just happen to go at the same time every day. One Jet does not have DOT authority, it just needs to file a charter prospectus with the DOT. One Jet charters airplanes from Contour. Since its flights are charters, anything with 30-seats or less can be operated under FAR 135. This is good since Contour doesn't have a 121 certificate. But it does have FAR 135 commuter authority and DOT authority to operate scheduled services, which is what it needs.

This is very interesting. I guess they will be forced to get the 121 certificate if their business model takes off. I hope they get there.

drdisque wrote:

Perhaps the schedule didn't work for the same aircraft to operate both routes, due to the time change going to Columbus. If the aircraft went to Columbus first, then perhaps the return from Omaha ended up leaving too late. If it went to Omaha first then definitely the morning return from Columbus to Milwaukee would have been way too late. I don't know what the schedule was, but it probably resulted in a a schedule where flying two turns twice a day with the same aircraft didn't result in a viable schedule.

That doesn’t explain the drop of Omaha. The Columbus schedule did not change a bit from when OMA operated and when it was dropped. The plane runs the very same Columbus schedule and then sits idle instead of doing the two OMA flights.

AviationGeek78 wrote:

rj777 wrote:

Could this bring back MKE-OMA possibly?

This will not come back. It wasn't killed because of aircraft availability. The loads were bad.

No, they were not. The DoT stats show Omaha was not an underperformer. It was a slower starter in its first month (November) but since then it has been right in line with the pack and consistently ahead of PIT-SDF and PIT-PVD. For December through February I come up with a raw load factor (not adjusted for stage length) of 61.5% in the OneJet system. Omaha averaged 62.0% in the same period.

November (CMH and OMA start)
76.6% ….. PIT ……. IND
73.2% ….. PIT ……. BDL
69.9% ….. PIT ……. ALB
62.8% ….. MKE ….. PIT
61.4% ….. PIT ……. CVG
60.7% ….. MKE ….. CMH
60.0% ….. PIT ……. RIC
59.8% ….. PIT ……. SDF
57.1% ….. PIT ……. PVD
49.2% ….. MKE ….. OMA

December
71.9% ….. PIT ……. BDL
68.1% ….. PIT ……. IND
67.5% ….. PIT ……. RIC
66.7% ….. PIT ……. ALB
63.2% ….. MKE ….. CMH
63.1% ….. PIT ……. CVG
59.9% ….. MKE ….. OMA
57.7% ….. MKE ….. PIT
54.7% ….. PIT ……. SDF
52.1% ….. PIT ……. PVD

January
69.1% ….. PIT ……. BDL
68.2% ….. PIT ……. IND
65.0% ….. PIT ……. ALB
64.6% ….. MKE ….. CMH
60.0% ….. MKE ….. PIT
58.2% ….. MKE ….. OMA
50.4% ….. PIT ……. SDF
48.0% ….. PIT ……. PVD

February
70.9% ….. MKE ….. PIT
69.5% ….. PIT ……. BDL
67.6% ….. MKE ….. OMA
67.5% ….. PIT ……. IND
65.2% ….. MKE ….. CMH
64.4% ….. PIT ……. ALB
63.6% ….. PIT ……. SDF
59.9% ….. PIT ……. PVD
35.5% ….. BUF …… ALB (first 1/2 month)

In the most recently month (February) Omaha was the 3rd fullest market. We won’t know March stats for another month but it was likely at least solid. 40% of MKE’s flights in March were to Omaha and (per MKE airport stats) OneJet ran 71.0% full in March overall in Milwaukee, four points fuller than February. So March was not a washout for Omaha either.

If you take note of the three suspended markets – Cincinnati, Omaha and Richmond – none of them were underperformers in terms of load. The obvious other factor is fare – was it too low? That doesn’t make sense either. OneJet has done little experimentation with fare differentiation on most of their business-jet routes. I don’t think MKE-OMA or MKE-CMH have varied, and if fare was the issue they would have tried to raise it.

Why did they suspend the routes they did? It’s a good question. Others on this board have previously cited aircraft availability largely driven by heavy maintenance constraints. The business jet fleet has definitely shrunk. Why did Cincinnati and Richmond get the ax but Louisville continues 2x/day? Maybe it’s a matter of keeping key customers in certain markets happy. If there is an underperformer from last fall's expansion it's Providence, but it also continues. Also it’s been posted that MKE-OMA was cut because they didn’t want to base pilots in Milwaukee. There still a plane which spends the night here, so there has to be a crew here every weekday morning to take the 6:00am MKE-CMH flight. But maybe with only doing the two CMH round trips (and skipping OMA) they can get away with fewer crews spending the night in Milwaukee.

And…if they plan to phase out these last few business jets this is all temporary. Statements to the press in Milwaukee and Pittsburgh say they are moving that direction, and that’s prior to the Ultimate acquisition. Now they talk about perhaps two dozen aircraft by year end. If they do restore suspended flying with some of the added lift, I don’t see a convincing reason Omaha would not be likely.

I don’t claim to have all the answers on this – OneJet is not the easiest nut to crack and their habit of making public announcements with dates and then those dates sliding – sometimes without any further word – is frustrating. But where we do have solid information…such as traffic stats…they are worth looking at.

 
 
 
 
 
 

Anyone know when the remaining 8 E135 are supposed to arrive?

Blerg wrote:

Anyone know when the remaining 8 E135 are supposed to arrive?

Out of curiosity did you hear something about 8 additional E135 someplace or are you getting that based on their projection to have about two dozen planes by year end?

Assuming they do get several additional RJ's this year I wonder if the plan is for Ultimate to operate them, Contour, or a split. Hopefully we'll have a better idea of their near-term plans later this month.

flyPIT wrote:

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/onejet-enters-agreement-to-acquire-ultimate-jetcharters-300640138.html

https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/flights/todayinthesky/2018/05/01/onejet-buy-ultimate-jet-charters-continues-expand/568261002/


Ultimate JetCharters to be integrated into OneJet's scheduled network. Ultimate Air Shuttle and its scheduled network to remain separate for now.

Schedule changes, upgauges, and new seasonal destinations to be announced in May.

If oil stays high I think it does a lot of damage to their model.

enilria wrote:

flyPIT wrote:

https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/onejet-enters-agreement-to-acquire-ultimate-jetcharters-300640138.html

https://www.usatoday.com/story/travel/flights/todayinthesky/2018/05/01/onejet-buy-ultimate-jet-charters-continues-expand/568261002/


Ultimate JetCharters to be integrated into OneJet's scheduled network. Ultimate Air Shuttle and its scheduled network to remain separate for now.

Schedule changes, upgauges, and new seasonal destinations to be announced in May.

If oil stays high I think it does a lot of damage to their model.

It will not stay high.