The events of September 11 and the subsequent economic fallout have tested the competitive mettle of airlines worldwide. Thankfully for those that escaped the fate suffered by the now bankrupt Swissair and Sabena, the hundreds of smaller carriers that comprise the often overlooked regional airline sector have supplied a source of relative strength.
Unencumbered by unwieldy administrative burdens and the high labor costs of major airlines, regionals for years have supplied a healthy diet of connecting traffic to hub cities. The agility and efficiency with which they’ve rendered such service later proved equally valuable in supplementing or, in some cases, replacing mainline airplanes in marginal markets. But not until September 11 had airlines, travelers and whole communities benefited so vastly from regionals’ ability to salvage markets incapable of producing enough revenue to support full-size narrowbody jets.
