Donald J. Carty

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Donald J. Carty (born 1946) is a Canadian businessman who serves as chairman of Virgin America and Porter Airlines. He was previously chairman and CEO of AMR Corporation, the parent company of American Airlines, from 1998 to 2003.

Born in Toronto, Canada in 1946, he attended Queen's University and Harvard Business School. He worked for Air Canada and the Canadian Pacific Railway before joining American, although he moved to Canadian Pacific Airlines from 1985 to 1987. At American, he served as controller, and later as executive vice president for finance and planning under CEO Robert Crandall.

In April of 2003, Carty and his executive board struck a cost-cutting deal with American's labor unions, intended to mitigate AMR's upcoming $1 billion first-quarter loss. The deal unraveled several days later, when unions learned that AMR executives were keeping $41 million in retention bonuses. Several AMR board members, most notably University of Oklahoma president David Boren, called for Carty's resignation.

Carty resigned on April 24, 2003. He was replaced as CEO by Gerard Arpey, and as chairman by Edward A. Brennan.

Carty was appointed as Chairman of Virgin America on February 6, 2006.^[1] On February 2 of that year, Toronto-based Porter Airlines, in the process of starting up a small regional service out of the downtown Toronto City Centre Airport, announced that Carty would simultaneously serve as its chairman. He is also a director of Sears, Roebuck and Dell Computer.