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Kiwi pecks at Northwest
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September 10, 1998: 8:27 a.m. ET
Airline to begin service Sunday to Minneapolis as NWA strike drags on
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NEW YORK (CNNfn) - One-time bankrupt carrier Kiwi International Air Lines said Thursday it is picking up where Northwest Airlines left off.
Kiwi said it will begin non-stop flights between Newark-Minneapolis, Detroit-Minneapolis and Chicago-Minneapolis Sunday.
The Minneapolis market has been without airline service since pilots struck Northwest Airlines late last month, grounding all of its flights. Northwest currently is the only carrier with flights to Minneapolis.
"Minneapolis was dominated by Northwest with high fares and very little competition," said Jerry Murphy, Kiwi's president and chief executive officer. "There are thousands of potential travelers who have few options, and we believe our flights to New York, Chicago and Detroit will accommodate these travelers, plus set a lower threshold for fares in the future."
Fares for Newark-Minneapolis begin at $139 each way, for Detroit-Minneapolis at $99, and for Minneapolis-Chicago at $59.
In other developments surrounding the Northwest strike, U.S. Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater and Attorney General Janet Reno are filing a lawsuit in federal district court in Minneapolis against Northwest and Mesaba Holdings Inc., the larger of Northwest's two Northwest Airlink commuter jet partners.
In compliance with a federal order, one of Northwest's commuter affiliates, Express Airlines I, has agreed to reinstate air service to five communities and another has filed plans to do so.
Mesaba and Express halted flights when 6,200 Northwest pilots walked off the job Aug. 29. The airlines said it wasn't cost efficient to remain in the air since most of their traffic connects to and from Northwest carriers in Minneapolis, Detroit and Memphis, Tenn.
Northwest has canceled its domestic flights through Friday and inbound flights from Europe and Asia have been canceled through Sunday. It has said it could take eight to 10 days to resume all services.
Kiwi, a 5-year-old upstart, emerged from a 10-month stint in Chapter 11 after a private investment group paid the airline's $16.5 million debt. Kiwi boasts a perfect flying record, but flights on the airline were temporarily suspended in 1994 after federal inspectors raised questions about its pilot-training records.
Kiwi, based in Newark, N.J., was founded by former employees of now-defunct Eastern and Pan Am airlines.
Shares of Northwest (NWAC) were down 1-5/8, or nearly 6 percent, at 26-1/2 Wednesday.
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Kiwi
Northwest Airlines
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