NATCHEZ, Miss. – Local officials and residents are celebrating the arrival Wednesday of commercial airline service to Natchez-Adams County after three decades of being without, but the challenge ahead is to ensure it’s financially viable for the air carrier.
“It’s difficult to get the air service, but it’s even more difficult to keep it,” said Jeremiah Gerald, the consultant city and county officials hired to help lure United Express to the Natchez-Adams County Airport. “So we need to make sure that we’re filling those seats.”
United Airlines’ regional partner — SkyWest — will be operating the Natchez-to-Houston connection using 50-seat jets for the early afternoon, once-a-day flights to and from Hardy-Anders Field and George Bush Intercontinental Airport, a major United Airlines hub for connecting flights globally.
“If these guys are not making a profit here in Natchez, they do have the ability to move to another destination,” said Gerald, pointing to other small communities competing for airline service.
Natchez-Adams County officials have been aggressively wooing passenger air carriers since 2021. The Adams County-owned airport hasn’t had regular airline service since the mid-1990s.
United and Skywest Airlines last October agreed to come lured partly by $950,000 in government money. The risk-mitigation fund is “to offset any losses” the airlines could suffer financially serving Natchez and the surrounding area, Gerard said. The money includes a $750,000 grant awarded to Natchez-Adams County in 2022 by the Federal Aviation Administration and $200,000 in city-county funds.
Meeting early June with Natchez Mayor Dan Gibson and other local officials, Gerard highlighted the financial risks United-SkyWest are taking serving the community with a projected small profit margin.
“We have high fuel costs right now, so that’s going into this equation. It’s going to be a little more expensive to operate that airplane now. So we need to be filling those airplanes (with passengers) as much as possible.”
A Gulfport-based aviation and marketing specialist, Gerald works for the ASM Global Route Development consulting firm.
While air fares vary, a one-way ticket from Houston (IAH) to Natchez (HEZ) cost $249 on Tuesday booked from United’s website for the Wednesday flight. It’s to depart IAH at 11:55 am and arrive HEZ at 1:10 pm. Gibson has said he plans to be on that maiden flight for the ceremonial arrival at Hardy-Anders Field.
The SkyWest-operated, United Express-logoed Bombardier jets are to depart HEZ daily at 1:45 pm and arrive IAH at 3:05 pm. Next week’s July 7 flight to Houston has a $199 ticket price.
The new air service has been lauded as an economic “game changer” to bring more tourists and businesses to Natchez. It also provides a travel convenience for area residents no longer having to make long drives to and from regional airports in New Orleans, Jackson and Baton Rouge.
Local use is a key to ensuring the new passenger air service’s financial success, Gerard said. “That’s what’s going to be what sustains the service in the short term,” he said.
In advance of the July 1 start of airline service for Natchez-Adams County, an aggressive marketing campaign has been underway with a $150,000 advertising budget to get passengers to fly.
To accommodate airline employees, transportation security officers and passengers, an existing airplane hanger has been converted into a terminal at a cost of nearly $7 million. The old airport terminal – an antebellum-style structure built in 1959 – is functionally obsolete.
The airport had commercial passenger planes landing here between the early 1950s and late 1980s and again briefly in the mid-1990s, according to the airport’s historical records.
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