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Founded | 1963 as Carnarvon Air Taxis | ||||||
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Hubs | Perth Airport | ||||||
Frequent-flyer program | Velocity Frequent Flyer | ||||||
Fleet size | 24 | ||||||
Destinations | 10 | ||||||
Parent company | Virgin Australia Holdings | ||||||
Headquarters | Perth, Australia | ||||||
Key people | Merren McArthur, CEO | ||||||
Website | www |
Virgin Australia Regional Airlines (formerly Skywest) is an Australian regional airline company based in Perth; servicing key towns in the state of Western Australia as well as interstate destinations Darwin, Melbourne, Brisbane, Canberra and Sydney. It also serves regional destinations in New South Wales and Queensland and operates charter flights to Bali. In April 2013 Skywest was purchased by Virgin Australia Holdings as its new regional offshoot, and renamed Virgin Australia Regional Airlines.
Virgin Australia Regional was formed in 1963 as Carnarvon Air Taxis flying charter flights with small general aviation aircraft out of Carnarvon, Western Australia. In 1979 it changed its name to Skywest Aviation and moved to Perth's Jandakot Airport. In 1980 Skywest Airlines was formed, based at Perth Airport, and acquired Stillwell Airlines and its routes; the combined fleet included 39 aircraft, making it the second largest commuter airline in Australia at the time. The Skywest Airlines/Aviation fleet included a mix of general aviation types and small airliners including GAF N-24 Nomads, Embraer EMB 110 Bandeirantes, Beechcraft King Air 200s & Fairchild SA-227 Metro IIIs, as well as smaller types such as Cessna 182 Skylanes and Piper Aztecs.