Air Charters - into major airports?

[briansommers 74]

do air charter flights go into major airports?for example like KATL, KCTL, KIAD, KORD, KJFK, etc etc?? or is it mostly small airports besides the big ones?I suppose since it is charter it would be POSSIBLE but just wondering how often it really happensthanksbs

[Guest BlueRidgeDx]

It depends.Ninety percent of the time, passengers want to use secondary airports, for instance, HEF instead of IAD, PNE instead of PHL, PDK instead of ATL, TEB instead of EWR, and VNY or SNA instead of LAX, etc. Mostly it has to do with ease of access, and the percieved notion that it's less busy, thus "easier" and more "exclusive".That said, there have been plenty of times when, for one reason or another, I've sent an Avanti II into PHL, ATL, EWR, LAX and others. Sometimes the passenger decides it's more expedient, or they're catching an international flight from there. Other times, I convince them that the ridiculous ATC delays at places like TEB warrant switching to EWR which may have no delays at all.On the other hand, at another operator, I used to send Citations, Falcons, and Hawkers into primary airports fairly frequently. So it really depends on what the passenger wants. They pay big bucks for their share, and they use it pretty much any way they like.

[scott967 62]

IIRC there is a big charter terminal on the south side of KDCA. There's also a charter terminal at KLAS, but it's for scheduled charters, I don't know where the "netjets" kind of operations go.scott s..

[Guest BlueRidgeDx]

I don't know where the "netjets" kind of operations go.

The part I wrote about Citations, Falcons and Hawkers was actually in reference to NetJets. I wasn't there for very long, but the operation itself was pretty impressive. They have such a large operation, they literally hit every airport from 6S0 to ORD. Typically the Citation Ultra's, Excels, and Encores fly to the out of the way places (with exceptions, of course.). Citation Sovereigns, and Hawker 400XP to slightly larger places, and the Citation X, Hawker 800XP, Falcon 2000 into the largest airport.That's not to say that the Citation X or Falcon aren't show-horned into some tight places, or that Ultra's don't ever go to EWR, because they do. But generally speaking, it holds true.