Ryan International Airlines - History

History

The airline was established in Wichita, Kansas in 1972 and started operations on March 3, 1973. It was previously known as Ryan Aviation and was repurchased by Ronald Ryan in 1989. It began flying for the United States Postal Service under subcontract to Emery Worldwide Airlines in 1989. Passenger charter services began in 1983 from Atlantic City, Minneapolis/St Paul, Cleveland and Cincinnati. In 1992 Ryan started a South Pacific operation, flying fresh fish and general freight to Guam, Saipan and surrounding islands. The airline was wholly owned by Ronald Ryan until 2005, until purchased by commercial real-estate firm Rubloff Development Group. Ryan operated a number of AirTran Airways flights between Atlanta and the US west coast in 2003 and 2004, after which AirTran began operating the flights with their own Boeing 737s.

Since moving to Rubloff's headquarters in Rockford in 2006, Ryan has held a notable number of contracts working mainly for the Department of Defense and the United States Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Until summer 2008, it maintained large operations in Milwaukee, St. Louis, and Boston for Funjet and Apple Vacations. These contracts were terminated following the failure of European carrier Futura International Airways, from which Ryan leased several aircraft to support this operation.

The pilots belong to the ALPA union. while the flight attendants belong to the AFA union.

In November 2011, Ryan took delivery their first Airbus 330-300 (N771RD), leased from Virgin Atlantic.

In February 2012, Ryan furloughed Pilots, Flight Attendants and support staff. On March 6, 2012 Ryan filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy, citing "unexpected and dramatic reductions in military flying." On April 1, 2012, Ryan lost its bid to continue flying for DHS. The loss of the DHS contract resulted in the immediate grounding of four MD-80 aircraft to cut costs. On August 1, 2012 Ryan returned its A330-300 to Virgin Atlantic Airlines and ended its lease and accepted an older model A330-200 (Tail N772RD) formerly operated by AtlasJet Airlines. Six days later, Jeff Potter, former CEO of Frontier Airlines was hired as the "Chief Restructuring Officer" for Ryan. He is also the President/CEO of the Restructuring firm "Boyd Group" which is being paid $50,000/month for his services. Ryan's President Mike McCabe's position was eliminated. On August 15, 2012 Ryan announced it will be furloughing approximately 30 pilots and 60 flight attendants over the next few weeks. 2 days later, the majority of flight attendants voted yes to the AFA Contract agreement. At the end of that month, 25 or more management and administrative positions were eliminated. Those positions received same-day notice as the company attempts to cut further costs. Ryan also announced it will be furloughing more pilots and approximately 18 more flight attendants.