Mark Huber is an aviation industry veteran who has worked in the flight training, aircraft sales, aircraft component, and airport development businesses. He has flight time in more than 50 different and diverse aircraft, including helicopters, aerobatic aircraft, vintage warbirds, jet fighters, business jets and turboprops, and transport-category aircraft. He has jumped out of several of these—on purpose—with a parachute. His defense and aviation journalism has been published in a variety of national and international periodicals.

Contributor

Mark Huber

Reports have surfaced in the last few days, including from Bloomberg, that air ambulance provider Air Methods is contemplating a structured Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing.
The move would cede control of the company to creditors that are owed $1.25 billion. The loans, with floating interest rates, come due next April. Another $500 million on 8 percent interest bonds is due in 2025. Rating agency Moody’s is grading that debt as Caa3, deep into the highly speculative or “junk” category.
Much of that debt was tied to the $2.5 billion acquisition of Air Methods by private equity firm American Securities in 2017. Investment data company Macroaxis recently gave Air Methods a “100 percent” chance of bankruptcy. AIN’s attempts to solicit comment from Air Methods prior to today’s deadline were not successful.
As early as 2017, financial analysts were warning that the company’s business model was not sustainable as it was becoming dependent on ever-increasing transport price hikes charged to private payers/insurance companies in a saturated market. Those price hikes stemmed from Medicare/Medicaid transport reimbursements for patients covered by those programs that were substantially below costs.
That problem was exacerbated when Congress incorporated the “No Surprises Act” (NSA) into the second Covid relief package (the Consolidated Appropriations Act) in 2021. The act was supposed to insulate patients when it came to payment disputes between healthcare providers and payers, including insurance companies. Critics charged that provisions of the legislation gave insurance companies outsized power in settling billing disputes, providing them wide latitude to delay, discount, and deny claims.
The consequences hit providers with community-based air ambulance programs, such as Air Methods, particularly hard, and the company, which operates more than 400 air ambulances nationwide, most of them helicopters, began closing bases last year. Reports also surfaced that the NSA’s impact trimmed the company’s revenues in recent quarters by more than 50 percent. (Air Methods is privately held and does not disclose financial data.)
While certain implementation rules for the NSA have been successfully challenged in federal court, including last year when air ambulance provider LifeNet brought suit, that is likely a temporary reprieve as the relevant federal agencies, including Health and Human Services and Labor, tweak those rules to pass legal muster.
But any bankruptcy filing by Air Methods could be followed by more from other air ambulance providers. Last year, Christopher Eastlee, Association of Air Medical Services vice president for public affairs, expressed doubt that enough of the NSA could be sufficiently changed and done soon enough to provide needed relief. “Can we wait it out? I don’t know if we can,” he said.

News and issues regarding all manner of civil and military rotorcraft and their powerplants, including helicopters, tilt rotors and unmanned air vehicles.

Report: Air Methods Considering Bankruptcy

Would an Air Methods bankruptcy be a harbinger for medevac industry?

The canary in the coal mine for a distressed air ambulance industry or just a bad business deal? Air Methods is reportedly considering bankruptcy.

2024 Corporate Aviation Leadership Summit

Matt Thurber

News and issues relating to business, corporate and private aviation, primarily regarding turbine-engine-powered airplanes and helicopters. Subjects include aircraft, engines, maintenance, operations, personnel, acquisitions, accidents, safety, security, and training.

Helicopters are ideal for wildfire suppression, rescue, and emergency medical services

LA County Orders Two Sikorsky S-70i Firehawks

News and developments about everything that goes into the cabin of an aircraft, from floor coverings to headliners, with a special emphasis on in-flight entertainment, communications and other electronics for passengers. If it is in the cabin of an aircraft, it’s covered here.

Broadband connectivity enabled by patented bonded architecture

Outerlink Air IP Comms System Now Available on Bell 407

News about simulators and training procedures, as well as workforce.

Essential news and analysis on the defense aerospace business. Your trusted source for new and ongoing programs and requirements in military aircraft (manned and unmanned), engines, avionics, weapons and associated systems, including ground-based air defense.

Helicopter Institute is running a U.S. Navy Contractor Operated Pilot Training program

TH-66 Tapped for U.S. Navy Contractor Pilot Training

News and issues about aviation maintenance, repair and overhaul (MRO), covering all segments of the aviation industry; and modifications for aircraft and engines. Subjects include product support of aircraft, engines and avionics, MRO company mergers, acquisitions, announcements and personnel, Airworthiness Directives, Supplemental Type Certificate approvals and other topics.

Delivery of the first modified helicopter is due in early 2026

Metro Aviation First with EMS STC for Airbus H160

Jessica Reed

News and developments about airplanes, helicopters and unmanned air vehicles used in all varieties of operations, including airlines, military, business, commercial, general aviation and private.

News and issues relating to the aerospace industry that are related to the science, engineering and business of flight in space involving civil, industrial and military applications, and similar topics related to flight in the atmosphere of the Earth that are not covered more directly by other AINonline subject channels. In other words, both astronautical and aeronautical subjects, except for those aeronautical topics that are specifically covered elsewhere on this website.

Q3 revenues climbed 10% year over year, driven by accelerating work on the MV-75 program

Bell’s Commercial Helicopter Deliveries Slide in Q3 

Neelam Mathews

News and issues concerning general aviation, specifically airplanes and helicopters powered by piston and alternative engines (i.e., non-turbine powered aircraft). Subjects include aircraft, engines, personnel, acquisitions, accidents, safety, security and training.

Indian H125 final assembly line expected by March 2026

Mahindra Joins Rotor Chain as Tata-Airbus Readies H125 FAL

New developments and products in avionics, specifically about aircraft electronics in the cockpit.

Four-axis system will help pilots reduce risk in critical phases of flight

Heli Austria Picks Thales/StandardAero StableLight Autopilot

Hanneke Weitering

News and issues relating to civil and military unmanned aircraft systems (UAS), unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and remotely piloted aircraft systems (RPAS) of all kinds and sizes, including those used for intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR), combat (unmanned combat air vehicles, or UCAVs), law enforcement, research and other applications. Of particular focus is the FAA's planned integration of UAS into the U.S. national airspace system.

More In Rotorcraft