By Mary Alice Murphy

At a meeting at 9 a.m., members of the Advanced Air team out of California met and chatted with residents of Silver City, at the Grant County Veterans Memorial Business and Conference Center in the lobby.

"We are working hard to hit the ground running, while dotting our Is and crossing our Ts," Levi Stockton, founder and president of Advanced Air, said. He also is a pilot of the King Air 350s the service will fly. "We are doing what we said we were going to do. Our performance will speak for itself."

He said the schedule provides 17 round trips to Albuquerque a week and seven round trips to Phoenix, Arizona. The flights to Phoenix will have two each way on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, with one round trip on Sunday. See a PDF of the schedule at the bottom of this article.

"We heard requests for people to be able to do a round trip to Phoenix in one day to do business and then come home later that day," Stockton said. "The schedule will also allow for connecting flights."

Grant County Commission Chairman Billy Billings said reliable commuter air service is not just a service, but is essential to Grant County. "We have had productive conservations with Advanced Air. They listened to the community and worked out a better schedule. Their planes are roomier, more comfortable, more reliable and are safer twin-engine aircraft. I am convinced Advanced Air will take air service to a new level in Grant County."

He introduced other commissioners, with Gabriel Ramos and Brett Kasten being present and Alicia Edwards and Harry Browne not there at the time, County Manager Charlene Webb, General Services Director Randy Villa, Airport Manager Rebekah Wenger, Southwest New Mexico Council of Governments Executive Director Priscilla Lucero, as others having had input into the decision.

Stockton thanked the commissioners for their trust in his company. "We are excited to be here. It's our second trip down and the weather is always beautiful. January 6, we will start our flights to Albuquerque and Phoenix. We are a high-end charter, mostly point-to-point on-demand charter, based in Los Angeles. We have gone through the process to do fixed-seat flights and scheduled air service. Essential Air Service rose to the top. We plan to continue to provide our high-end service. We will stick to the Southwest, so we can stay close to our home base, provide good service and stay true to who we are. Our King Air 350s have eight club seats and an extra seat in the back. Each plane can carry 550 pounds of cargo, which is 200 pounds more than your current service. It also has wing lockers for skis or guns or whatever you want to put in them. It flies about 40 knots faster the your current service's aircraft and twin engines give more reliability. We operate at a high level and are audited by third parties, so we have strong safety standards. Our pilots all go through Flight Simulator training, so they learn to deal with issues that we couldn't practice with aircraft, like catching fire and all the bad things that could happen."

He introduced members of his team, who were present, including Michael Wootton, vice president of operations; Julia of customer experience; Aaron Krieger, sales and marketing; and Barbara Hunt, "who does just about everything else."

Stockton also pointed out consultants, Kaylie, Andy and Mark.

"Our goal is to embrace being here," Stockton said. "You will see us often. I will be flying the first flight. Julia and Brett are out looking at houses right now and taking this seriously and considering moving here."

Carol Czujko of the Mimbres Region Arts Council board said the group she represents is interested in bringing in tourists. "What are the marketing plans?"

Stockton said Krieger would be in charge of that. "Scott (Terry) has been helpful to us. Our No. 1 goal is to provide service that is reliable. And 2) to connect flights in Phoenix, and 3) work on trips for the Blues Festival and the Tour of the Gila. We're working on a calendar for the year to promote bringing people in, as well as taking people out of Silver City."

She asked if Advanced Air had done EAS before. Stockton said they had not, but "we fly to multiple cities in California daily and we do packages to Las Vegas and ski trips. The amount of flying here for a month is about equal to what we do regularly in a week."

He said the flights to Phoenix would arrive at terminal 2, and passengers would go into terminal 3 once construction is completed. He explained that it was impossible to put luggage on in Silver City and have it transfer to connecting flights, because of no TSA out of Grant County Airport. Passengers would have to take care of their luggage transfer themselves.

When asked when booking would be available, Stockton said some flights are already booked online.

Western New Mexico University President Joseph Shepard asked if a booklet of a number of flights to be bought at one time to be used when needed would be available.

Stockton said he would go into pricing. "If you buy a book of 15 flights, for instance, they will cost $79 each way, the same as booking a flight in advance and would be refundable."

Talking about the reliability of flights, Stockton said "Weather issues, we can't avoid. To address mechanical issues, we are considering maybe having two planes here, but option 2 may be the more likely, with one on standby at our base [the JetCenter in Hawthorne, California]. We communicate well. We will call you if there are issues."

An audience member asked if there would be better rates for veterans. Stockton said they would consider putting something together for veterans.

Lucero asked about ground transportation from the airport in Grant County.

"We experienced that on this trip," Stockton said, "with no rental cars available from the airport. We are reaching out to local providers and working with Enterprise. We hopefully can become an agent for Enterprise. We will try to work it out.

"We will be invested in the community," he continued. "Our team is committed to being here often. How we engage will be worked out."

To a question about the unreliability of the current service in Grant County, Stockton said the company has figured out it can have eight crews and one airplane just for the flights in and out of the Grant County airport. "The other carrier is connecting the dots across the country. We will have two airplanes dedicated to this local service. We want to do well with the core service. We would rather service one place, Silver City, very well."

The questioner replied that Silver City is a community of voices. "We can let other people know whether the service is good or bad."

After the session was over, individuals chatted with the Advanced Air team members on individual concerns and needs.

For more information on pricing or to book a flight out of or into Silver City, visit https://www.advancedairlines.com/silver-city-chooses-advanced-air-llc-for-eas-service/  . The link to pricing information is immediately above the Book a Seat Now icon.

{pdf}mypdfs/Advanced-Air-schedule.pdf{/pdf}