Aerolitoral

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AeroLitoral

IATA 5D	ICAO SLI	Callsign Costera
Founded		1991
Hubs		Gen. M. Escobedo Int'l Airport Miguel Hidalgo Int'l Airport Gen. Roberto F. Villalobos Int´l Airport
Focus cities		Gen. I. L. Pesqueira Int'l Airport
Fleet size		33(11 orders)
Destinations		34
Parent company		Consorcio Aeroméxico S.A. de C.V.
Headquarters		Monterrey, Nuevo León, Mexico
Key people		Raúl Sáenz (CEO)
Website: http://www.aerolitoral.com.mx

Aerolitoral is the regional airline of Aeroméxico based in Monterrey, Nuevo León and with a small maintenance and crew base of Saab-340B's in Guadalajara, and Embraer ERJ 145 in Mexico City Mexico. It operates feeder services to Aeroméxico's hub airports, using 4 digit flight numbers. It is considered the biggest and most important regional airline in Mexico, offering more than 207 scheduled flights daily to 34 destinations in Mexico and 3 in the United States. Its main base are in General Mariano Escobedo International Airport in Monterrey (ERJ 145 and Saab-340b) and Don Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla International Airport in Guadalajara (Saab-340B) and General Roberto Fierro Villalobos International Airport in Chihuahua.

1 History
2 Destinations
3 Fleet
4 External links

[edit] History

The airline was formed as Servicios Aereos Litoral and became a subsidiary of Aeroméxico on 1 December 1990. It started with a fleet of 4 NAMC YS-11 aircraft in 1988 (XA-ROL, XA-ROV, XA-RPU and XA-RRG) with some pilots from the bankrupt Aeromexico his later and actual parent Airline it was originally based in Veracruz. In February 1992 Aeroméxico started another regional feeder airline, Aerovias de Poniente, S.A. de C.V. in Guadalajara using Fairchild Metros.

The fleet was replaced and expanded quite fast between 1991 and 1995 and grew to a total of 29 Fairchild Metro III and 23 series aircraft between the two feeders. On 1991 the main base was moved to Monterrey and in 1992 Aeroponiente started operations from Guadalajara the pilot seniority list was merged and a common paint scheme was adopted using the AeroMexico Logo. Since 1992 Aerolitoral has been the only source of pilots for AeroMexico with more than 400 pilots transferred till today.

On 1993 a small base was opened in Culiacán and after 3 months was moved to Chihuahua by 1995 the commuter airline had 3 bases with 29 airplanes . There were constant labor problems and a Pilot Strike on early 1994.

The route network expanded all across the north of Mexico and some routes to the USA were operated for a brief time like Harlingen, Corpus Christy and Austin Texas, the main routes to the USA operated on this period were San Antonio TX., Tucson AZ., El Paso TX. and Phoenix AZ. In 1996 the two airlines were merged into AeroLitoral S.A de C.V. on the early 1997 labor problems continued and there was another Pilot Strike.

There was a high demand for a bigger airplane in the route network and the Fairchild Metro 19 seater was not enougth and after a long selection, the Saab 340B's were introduced on late 1997. On 1998 new services to the USA were added from Piedras Negras Coah. and from Chihuahua to Dallas Forth Worth.

On early 1999 AeroLitoral was operating 29 Fairchild Metro's and 6 Saab 340B's for a total of 35 aircraft. One Farchild Metro XA-RYY had been converted to freigter and operations to Mexico City were resumed on behalf of AeroMexpress.

On August 1999 a new CEO was appointed and Raúl Sáenz Campos was replacing Carlos Treviño Treviño after a long time being at the airline. On December of the same year was the beginning of a very slow process, replacing the first 3 Fairchild Metro's with 3 Saab 340B's.

In the period between the years 2000 and 2002 13 more Saab 340B's were added to replace Metros, with a peak fleet of 22 airplanes. On September 6 2001 there was an accident without any fatalities the XA-ACK landed 15 miles south Tijuana due to fuel starvation, there was a false indication in the fuel gauges on the flight deck caused by a defective element on the sistem reflecting there was more fuel.

After 9/11 2001 AeroLitoral experienced the drop on air traffic and downsized the fleet in order to survive, services to San Diego, California, El Paso and Laredo, Texas were cancelled, San Antonio, Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona were reduced and with the grow of Aviacsa on the domestic market with 737-200's invading the most profitable routes from and to Monterrey like Leon, Ciudad Juarez, Culiacan and Guadalajara. The small conmmuter was in a big struggle and in 2002 many employees were laid off among them 50 pilots.

On 2002 services to Los Angeles and Ontario were introduced on behalf of AeroMexico, services to Phoenix and Laredo were cancelled, and later on December 2002 there were still labor problems, and there was another pilot strike.

On 2003 with a fleet of 3 Fairchild Metro and 22 Saab 340B's this year the load factors were recovering like many other Airlines around the globe, that same year AeroLitoral announced the first 5 ERJ 145's orders with deliveries starting on mid. 2004.

On May 2004 the first 3 ERJ 145's arrived to Monterrey from Brazil they started replacing the Saabs on the routes from and to Monterrey over 1h 50m the first fligts were mainly to Chihuahua, Guadalajara and Cd. Juarez. On this same year a contract of wet lease starting on June 2004 was sign between AeroCaribe and AeroLitoral the agreement stated that AeroLitoral should provide service in the routes on the South East of the country on behalf of AeroCaribe the contract covered the wet lease of 3 Saab 340B's operating new routes to Merida, Tuxla Gutierrez and the shuttle between Cancun and Cozumel the agreement lasted a year and ended on late May 2005.

On 2005 the first scheduled service in and from Mexixo City on behalf of AeroMexico were intruduced in the first 2 routes Obregon and Los Mochis using the ERJ 145. The fleet since then has suffered significant changes, the Saab 340B has been gradually substituded by the ERJ 145 and by late 2006 and mid 2007 is expected to rise to 29 ERJ 145s the retirement of the Saab 340Bs is expected some time in middle 2007, and the first 5 brand new Embraer ERJ 190 are expected in 2007 apparently in September 2007.