Join us on Saturday November 12th at 8pm EST on Teamspeak and Vatsim for a special farewell event to mark the end of Washington Dulles’s 4 year service as a MetroAir Hub and to welcome Baltimore as our new East Coast home. The event will allow for a fly-out of IAD or a fly-in to BWI. If you’re feeling adventurous, do both!

If you do plan on doing both the fly-out and the fly-in, here are some suggested routes to allow you to complete all legs within the scheduled time for the event.

IAD>Chicago>BWI
IAD>Raleigh>BWI
IAD>Toronto>BWI
IAD>Boston>BWI
IAD>Detroit>BWI

If you are joining us for only the fly-out portion, try to fly out of Washington Dulles between 8 and 9pm EST. If you are joining us for the fly-in portion, try to fly into Baltimore Washington between 9pm and midnight EST. We are planning for the 777 ferry flight piloted by Mr. James Hepburn to be arriving at BWI around 11pm EST.

Washington has been MetroAir hub for 4 years and is one of the longest serving within the Airlines history. During its 4 year history Washington has flown more than 23,000 flights which acounts to more than 50% of the total flights metro air has filed during its 5 years. Many of the top filing pilots for Dulles are no longer with us, but some do remain such as Derrick Medlin, David Izzi, Tim Moskal, Diego Pedraglio and Michael Sarver. This is your last chance to be part of Washington’s legacy before Baltimore takes the limelight.

For those pilots who do take part in this Farewell event they will be given the new “iad2bwi” livery or reimbursed MetroMiles if already downloaded. So we hope to see you all there to fly the flag for Washington one final time.

Check MetroAir Virtual Airlines out at: http://www.metroairvirtual.com

The new "iad2bwi" commemorative livery

It is with great sadness that I announce that Derrick Medlin has tendered his resignation as hub manager to the executives.  Derrick has been not only a hub manager but a friend, confidant, and mentor to the entire pilot base as a whole.  I’m happy to report that he will remain on as a pilot and has not ruled out the possibility of returning to staff one day.  You will continue to see him flying online for the Kansas City Krushers, as well as seeing him on Teamspeak, etc.  I speak for the entire executive team, staff and pilots of MetroAir when extending our sincerest “Thank you” to Derrick for volunteering your personal time and for your dedication to all of us during your tenure as our Kansas City Hub Manager.  Derrick has definitely been a role model for all pilots, new and old alike.  Derrick will be handing over the keys to KMCI on February 1st, 2011.

With all that said, I would like to present Derrick with the highest honor we can bestow upon him here at MetroAir Virtual, the MetroAir Distinguished Service Award.  I can think of no one more deserving of the award.  Only six other pilots in the history of the VA have received this honor.
Congratulations Derrick!  

You can read a bit more from Derrick about his resignation in this thread:  http://www.metroairvirtual.com/forums/index.php?topic=11495.0

ATTENTION ALL KMCI pilots: We need to bring a win to KMCI for our departing Hub Manager, we can definitely pull this off.  Let’s give him a winning send off!

I’m pleased to announce that Sean Mullineaux has graciously accepted the position of Kansas City Hub Manager.  Sean joined MetroAir Virtual on November 15, 2009.  He’s also one of our MetroAir mentors and has recently mentored the first MetroAir student of the new MetroAir University to graduation!  He’s on Teamspeak nightly and looks forward to working with everyone at Kansas City and the entire pilot base.  Even though he was a pilot at ONT, I’m sure he will rally the forces behind Kansas City now to keep the paddle and award where it belongs (Me biased?…Nawwww :D)  He’ll be working with Derrick for the remainder of the month becoming familiar with all the systems behind the scenes to keep KMCI running like the finely tuned machine Derrick has built it up to.

Best Regards,
Lindle J. Romero
Chief Personnel Officer
MetroAir Virtual Airlines

The boards of both airlines — which operate more than 600 daily flights combined — approved the acquisition of Cirrus by MetroAir for an undisclosed figure in closed door meetings Wednesday afternoon. The Cirrus brand will be dissolved but the route network will be absorbed into MetroAir’s system. The merger combines MetroAir’s strengths on the coast lines with Cirrus’ routes originating in Chicago and Jacksonville.

When asked why Cirrus was agreeing to an acquisition Cirrus CEO, Jeremy Ballsmith, said “In an unfortunate situation, I feel that Metro is the best possible guardian of the Cirrus Air legacy. Over the past two years many including myself have worked hard to operate Cirrus in a realistic and professional manner. Through our merge I look forward to the realism Metro will bring to Cirrus pilots, and trust Metro Air’s decisions when it comes time to merge the airline into one.”

Of the combined routes, only one is shared between both airlines: Chicago Midway to Detroit. Kim Gesch, MetroAir’s Chief Operating Officer explained that MetroAir planned to integrate Cirrus’ full schedule and share booking, bidding and ticketing systems within three months. Gesch also announced that the Cirrus hubs at Chicago Midway and Jacksonville would be scaled down in the coming months.

“Cirrus Air has been on the radar of the MetroAir board for some time. We have been watching Cirrus shape itself under Mr. Ballsmith’s leadership and has taken on very similar business objectives, goals and operating structure as MetroAir in recent months.”, said MetroAir CEO Matt Calsada. He continued to say that the opportunity to fold Cirrus Air into MetroAir presented itself and was an excellent opportunity that MetroAir could not pass on. With last weeks announcement of acquiring 16 new A330s and the acquisition of Cirrus Air, MetroAir has launched itself in a prime position as a domestic and international carrier that can no longer be ignored by major US Carriers.

MetroAir Virtual has published a guide to the acquisition and answered a few of the common questions that will come up from staff and pilots of both airlines at http://www.metroairvirtual.com/merger/.

Like a frequent flyer program, pilots will earn miles for completing certain tasks and reaching milestones which help support MetroAir. Pilots will also have the opportunity to spend their MetroMiles™ with rewards such as bidding on charter flights and the opportunity to influence MetroAir’s next destination.

Visit the MetroAir website to learn more about MetroMiles.

Together with COO, Kim Gesch the newly appointed East Coast Operations Director is pleased to announce that, after extensive evaluation of the potential markets to be served from Kansas City, service flights to Detroit, Indianapolis, Memphis, Oklahoma City and New Orleans are available as of today.

Both regional and mainline services have been analyzed to provide optimum benefit to the entire MetroAir network. Prior to Hurricane Katrina, MSY served 9.7 million passengers per year, nearly all of them non-connecting. In 2009, it served 7,781,678 passengers, representing a decrease of 2.3% over the previous year.  CEO Matt Calsada believes MetroAir will also benefit greatly from the addition to the network and hopes the addition will also benefit New Orleans in increasing it’s businesses.

Visit MetroAir Virtual at: www.metroairvirtual.com

Chief Operating Officer Kim Gesch explained the reasoning behind the restructuring in a brief statement issued to the press.

“Recently we found our Airbus A330 fleet was losing money.  Our operations team analyzed the old route structuring and found that, under our current cost structuring, Ontario to Honolulu was not an optimal route for the A330.  Furthermore, we wanted to shift our focus with the A330 to international, transatlantic flights.

It was decided to go for ETOPS rating on the A319 fleet.  We have received our ETOPS rating on the A319 fleet, and we are now using the A319 fleet to fly from Onatrio International to Honolulu International.  It is our thought that this will further optimize our route system, and allow us to sustain growth through these tough economic times.”

Visit MetroAir Virtual at: http://www.metroairvirtual.com

Details on individual charter flights will be made prior to each game.  Multiple pilots will be able to fly the same bid, but you must bid on the flight prior to the game. The flights will not be allowed to be bid on after the start of a game. Pilots must meet the minimum type ratings required for the A321 aircraft to fly these charter flights.  Specialized liveries for both teams will be made available for pilots.

For more information, visit: www.MetroAirVirtual.com

With the statement came a short statement from the desk of Chief Financial Officer Matt Reichelderfer.

“While our profit grew for this month, it must be noted that a large chunk of this profit comes from the sale of our Boeing 757-200W fleet. If this sale is taken away MetroAir’s profit decreased from last month. This can be directly attributed to the discontinuation of the 757 fleet, and with it the majority of our long haul European operations.

However, with the elimination of our 757 fleet, we have managed to reduce cost by running an all Airbus Fleet. We have also replaced revenue that was lost with the discontinuation of service to Europe with the entry into service of the Airbus A320. The majority of those airframes were put into service on Domestic flights.

While this month our profit margin shrunk, we must remember that this is just some minor growing pains. We plan on developing our Domestic route structure even further, and reinforce operations out of Fort Lauderdale and Kansas City. These two cities will be key in MetroAir’s continued financial success.”

A full financial report can be found here

“MetroAir has seen a good amount of growth since the last financial statement was released.  The airline has basically changed it’s entire fleet to respond to a dynamically changing economic environment.  With the addition of new fleet types came the addition of routes, placing our airline in perfect position to compete even with the larger “brand name” airlines in America.  As you can read for yourself in our financial statement for this month we are in an excellent position to grow and expand into new airports in the future.”

In the previous years there was much speculation about the financial health of the airline as the airline had not released financial data for months. This release seems to have dispelled many of the rumors, and confirmed that MetroAir is in a good financial position to continue its growth in the coming years.

The financial statement can be read here.