Reno Air

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Reno Air

Reno Air was a scheduled passenger airline headquartered in Reno, Nevada, United States. Reno Air provided service from its hubs at Reno Tahoe International Airport in Reno, Nevada and San Jose International Airport in San Jose, California to destinations throughout the western United States, Canada (Vancouver, British Columbia) and with limited service to the US east coast.

Its fleet consisted of McDonnell Douglas MD-80 and MD-90 aircraft. In addition, Jetstream 31 aircraft were operated as Reno Air Express by Mid Pacific Air. Founded in June 1990, the airline's first flight was on July 1, 1992, a nonstop flight from Reno to Seattle-Tacoma International Airport in Seattle, Washington. Following the development of its Reno hub, the airline purchased the San Jose hub of American Airlines and built it up as a second hub.

At the same time, the airline joined American's AAdvantage program, allowing AAdvantage members to earn credit for flying Reno Air. While the airline flew most of its routes on the U.S. West Coast from their two hubs, Reno Air also operated a separate route system based in Gulfport, Mississippi.

The Mississippi airport was linked with flights to St. Petersburg and Orlando in Florida and Atlanta, Georgia. None of those four airports was linked to the rest of the Reno Air route system. The flights were operated as scheduled flights, not charter flights.

In February 1999, Reno Air was purchased by American, and flew its last flight on August 30 of that year. Although American at first retained the former Reno Air aircraft and repainted them into a modified version of the American Airlines color scheme (with a white fuselage instead of an unpainted one), American disposed of the entire Reno Air fleet in 2001 as part of capacity reduction efforts following the 9/11 attacks (this was the same case with former Trans World Airlines services that American had acquired).

The re-acquisition of the San Jose hub, which American did not want anyway, combined with other issues led to the remaining assets of the airline being dismantled. By the end of 2001 (especially after 9/11) nothing of the original Reno Air existed anymore, and American Airlines downgraded Reno to a spoke city rather than a hub.

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