West Coast Airlines
Overview
Regional airline
Regional airlines are airlines that operate regional aircraft to provide passenger air service to communities without sufficient demand to attract mainline service...
linking smaller communities with larger cities in the states of Washington, Oregon
Oregon
Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...
, Idaho
Idaho
Idaho is a state in the Rocky Mountain area of the United States. The state's largest city and capital is Boise. Residents are called "Idahoans". Idaho was admitted to the Union on July 3, 1890, as the 43rd state....
, Utah
Utah
Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...
, Montana
Montana
Montana is a state in the Western United States. The western third of Montana contains numerous mountain ranges. Smaller, "island ranges" are found in the central third of the state, for a total of 77 named ranges of the Rocky Mountains. This geographical fact is reflected in the state's name,...
, California
California
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
and northward to southern Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
. Its headquarters was located in the Westlake area of Seattle, Washington.
It was formed in 1941 and acquired Empire Air Lines (formerly Zimmerly Airlines) in 1952. The company was based at Boeing Field
Boeing Field
Boeing Field, officially King County International Airport , is a two-runway airport owned and run by King County, Washington, USA. In promotional literature, the airport is frequently referred to as KCIA, but this is not the airport identifier. The airport has some passenger service, but is mostly...
, Seattle, and began scheduled passenger service in 1946 with a fleet of DC-3s marketed as Scenicliners.
A promotional video for the company produced in the 1960s stated that in 1946 the Civil Aeronautics Board granted the first regional airline certificate to West Coast Airlines.
On July 1, 1968, West Coast merged with Pacific Air Lines
Pacific Air Lines
Pacific Air Lines was a regional airline serving the West Coast of the United States that began operations in the 1940s under the name Southwest Airways...
and Bonanza Air Lines
Bonanza Air Lines
Bonanza Air Lines was an international and domestic regional airline in operation from 1945 to 1968, with routes in the Western United States and Mexico...
to form Air West, which became Hughes Airwest
Hughes Airwest
Hughes Airwest was an airline that was backed by Howard Hughes. Hughes Airwest flew routes around the western United States and to certain points in Mexico and Canada. The airline was purchased by Republic Airlines on October 1, 1980...
in 1970.
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