SkyWest Airlines (OO, Salt Lake City) has withdrawn its Petition for Reconsideration of the essential air service (EAS) contract at Decatur, IL, IL, awarded to Cape Air (9K, Hyannis) as, due to the US government shutdown, the Department of Transportation (DOT) did not consider the Petition in due time.
"With Decatur's February start-date rapidly approaching, the lapse of the requested ten-day expedited review period and the government shutdown threatening to further delay consideration of the appeal, SkyWest is no longer able to hold aircraft in reserve and must commit its resources elsewhere," the carrier said in a document filed on January 22.
The regional specialist had earlier requested the DOT to reconsider its decision based on the general community support for SkyWest's proposal.
Cape Air was awarded the contract covering 24x weekly return flights from Decatur to Chicago O'Hare and 12x weekly return flights to St. Louis Lambert International commencing February 1, 2018, and running through to January 31, 2020. The airline will receive a USD2,915,273 subsidy in the first year of operations and USD3,002,731 in the second year. The DOT's decision to award the contract to Cape Air had been criticised earlier by the local and business community, including the global food processing corporation Archer Daniels Midland (ADM) which has a plant in Decatur.
SkyWest had earlier argued that while it requested a higher total subsidy of USD3,308,945, due to the planned use of 50-seat CRJ200 on the route, the per seat subsidy would have been much lower than in Cape Air's case.
