Chalk's International Airlines - History

History

The airline was founded by Arthur "Pappy" Chalk, and started ad-hoc charter operations as the Red Arrow Flying Service in 1917. After "Pappy" Chalk served in the Army Air Service in World War I, he returned to Miami and commenced scheduled service between Miami and Bimini in the Bahamas in February 1919 as Chalk's Flying Service. Chalk's first base was a beach umbrella on the Miami shore of Biscayne Bay. In 1926 a landfill island, Watson Island, was created in Biscayne Bay close to Miami. Chalk's built an air terminal there, and operated from the island for the next 75 years.

During Prohibition, Chalk's was a major source of alcohol smuggled from the Bahamas to the United States.

Pappy Chalk sold the airline to a friend in 1966, but continued to be involved in the daily operations of the airline until he retired in 1975. He died in 1977 at the age of 88.

In the early 1970s, Frakes Aviation bought the rights to the aircraft and began a conversion program, replacing the old Pratt & Whitney R-1340 Wasp radial engines with Pratt & Whitney Canada PT6 turboprops. By 1985 three of Chalk's eight Grumman Mallards had been converted, with five ex-military piston engined Grumman Albatross aircraft comprising the balance of the fleet.

In 1974 Resorts International purchased Chalk's Airlines, which became the primary air carrier to Paradise Island near the Bahamian capital of Nassau, where Resorts International owned and operated hotels and other resort facilities. After Resorts International constructed a runway on Paradise Island and switched to using conventional aircraft, it sold Chalk's in 1991 to United Capital Corporation, an Illinois-based investment firm.

United expanded Chalk's service to Key West, Florida and Nassau and acquired additional aircraft, but struggled financially. In 1996, United sold Chalk's to a group of investors, who operated the airline under the name Pan Am Air Bridge. In January 1998, Texas-based aircraft lease company Air Alaska purchased 70% of Pan Am Air Bridge, but following the collapse of Air Alaska, Pan Am Air Bridge filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection only a year later on January 11, 1999. James Confalone, a businessman and former Eastern Airlines pilot, purchased Chalk's out of bankruptcy for $925,000 on August 2, 1999; it had been reduced to two aircraft and only 35 staff. Confalone bought five additional Grumman Mallard seaplanes and arranged a contract to buy 14 larger Grumman G-111 seaplanes to expand the operation. On December 17, 1999, the airline was relaunched as Chalk's Ocean Airways.

In late 2001 following the September 11 attacks, Chalk's was forced to leave its longtime operations base on Watson Island due to security concerns over its proximity to the Port of Miami. Helicopter traffic had also increased around Watson Island. Operations moved to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, where Chalk's already had its maintenance base.

The airline suspended operations after the crash of Chalk's Ocean Airways Flight 101 on December 19, 2005. It had planned to resume flights between Fort Lauderdale and the Bahamas under its earlier name of Chalk's International Airlines on November 9, 2006, but its airworthiness certificate issued by the Bahamas had expired. It resorted to using aircraft "wet leased" from and operated by Big Sky Airlines to operate flights from Fort Lauderdale to Key West and to St. Petersburg, Florida. Chalk's added flights between Palm Beach International Airport (PBIA) and destinations in the Bahamas in late May 2007, but carried only 14 passengers through PBIA that August.

Chalk's ceased flying from Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport after September 3, 2007. After the final report from the Flight 101 crash investigation was released, the United States Department of Transportation revoked the airline's flying authority for scheduled service on September 30, 2007. Chalk's continued to hold its FAR 121 operating with a part 298 authority in good standing, and sought to add 60-passenger regional jets to its FAR 121 operating licence, but these efforts never came to fruition.

Chalk's had claimed to be the oldest continuously operating airline in the world, having begun operations in 1917 and scheduled flights in February 1919, and having only ceased operations for three years due to World War II, two days due to 1992's Hurricane Andrew, and eleven months due to an "at altitude tragedy" on December 19, 2005. The title of oldest continuously operating airline is now given to KLM of the Netherlands, founded later in 1919.