Silver Airways just passed another major airline milestone - it filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Again.

What does Silver’s latest filing tell us about the future of the regional market?

Not much, really.

Silver started its life as Gulfstream International Airlines, operating a fleet of 19-seat Beech 1900D aircraft. In 2011, Gulfstream filed Chapter 11, at which time the airline was bought by a group of investors and rebranded as Silver Airways.

The fleet was immediately updated to the Saab 340.

(Authors note: When was the last time you read the words “updated” and “to the Saab 340” in the same sentence?)

The Saab seated 34 passengers, an impressive up-gauge from the 19 on the Beech 1900Ds, and also required the airline’s first flight attendants.

In 2016, the airline was sold again, this time to a private equity company that also placed an order for 20 46-seat ATR42s. It wasn’t long before the airline was also operating the ATR72 in a 70-seat configuration.

For those keeping score, that’s 19 to 34 to 46 to 70 in just over five years. That’s a lot of additional capacity.

Operating large turboprop aircraft within the state of Florida is tough, especially when your chief competitors are two interstate highways. Silver also operated into the Bahamas and Cuba, with additional service in Puerto Rico upon the acquisition of Seaborne Airlines.

But with the thin routes came limited competition. Unfortunately for Silver, the competition was largely absent for a reason. (See: comment on thin routes one sentence prior).

The growth of the airline was in the direction most companies like to see. Some would say too much in that direction.

Silver grew to a peak in 2023 summer before several aircraft were parked, leveling the scheduled passenger capacity throughout 2024 and expected through 2025. Additionally, the airline signed a deal to fly ATR72s for Amazon - a deal that would last fewer than two years.

What does this all mean for the regional airlines?

Again, not much.

Silver was an anomaly in what we call the regional business today. The airline sold its own tickets on competitive U.S. service with large turboprop aircraft. While this may be the traditional definition of a regional airline, it is not indicative of the vast majority of the segment today, particularly in the U.S.

Even though this definition of regional airline has become the minority, many regional airlines still find success the old-fashioned way. Just north of the border, there is the world’s largest turboprop market, with successful independent regional airlines such as Air Creebec, PASCAN Aviation, and Bearskin Airlines. These are not big airlines, but that’s kind of the point.

Of course, then we have the monster regional airlines operating with partners in consistently profitable fashion. But that is a different analysis for a different day.

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