Charles M. Schulz-Sonoma County Airport gears up for new base operations, more flights, bigger planes

Charles M. Schulz–Sonoma County Airport will soon be busier than ever as the airlines serving the airport ramp up operations.

First up is Avelo Airlines. The Houston-based carrier is getting ready to open its planned base operations at the Santa Rosa airport May 1, first announced in January.

“We’re still working with them on their set up. They’ve (had) a big crew in town this week,” said Airport Manager Jon Stout, adding there has been “a flurry of activity” at the facility.

On that same day, Avelo begins previously announced nonstop flights from Sonoma County to Kalispell, Montana; Boise, Idaho; Salem, Oregon; and Pasco, Washington. The four new routes doubles the markets the carrier services from Santa Rosa. The existing routes are Burbank, Las Vegas, Palm Springs and central Oregon.

Five days later, on May 6, American Airlines will resume its seasonal flights to Dallas — with bigger planes.

American will be flying an Airbus A319 with 128 seats instead of the Embraer E175, with 76 seats, between Dallas and Santa Rosa.

Bringing in the bigger planes will involve more extensive groundwork before the Dallas flights resume in just over two weeks, Stout said.

“They've hired more people, and they are getting new equipment delivered because it takes a bigger tug and different tow bar,” Stout said. “And then they'll do training on-site with all of that new equipment.”

Separately, Stout said the Santa Rosa airport was minimally impacted by the ground stop Alaska Airlines issued Wednesday because of what it told the Business Journal in a statement was “an issue while performing an upgrade to the system that calculates our weight and balance.” The ground stop lasted roughly an hour, between 7:30 a.m. and 8:30 a.m. Pacific Standard Time, Alaska said.

Alaska’s first flight of the day from the Sonoma County airport departed before the ground stop, Stout said, but the service disruption had a ripple effect midday that resulted in delays.

Meanwhile, Sonoma County airport officials reported passenger figures for March, which totaled 49,507 travelers, down 0.3% from a year earlier. The total passenger count in February was 37,849.

Alaska Airlines last month flew 32,145 passengers through the airport, up 5.9% from a year prior. Its load factor — the measure of how full airplanes are on average — was 80%. Alaska flew 24,849 passengers through the facility in February.

Avelo Airlines in March flew 13,550, passengers through the Sonoma County airport, up 18.6% from a year prior. Its load factor was 64%. Avelo in February flew 9,465 passengers through Santa Rosa.

American Airlines flew 3,812 travelers through the Sonoma County facility in March, down 51.4% from March 2023. Its load factor was 95%. American in February flew 3,535 passengers.

Year to date, the airport has flown 125,909 passengers, down 0.8% from a year earlier, according to the figures.

The slight year-over-year decrease in passengers is attributed to American Airlines reducing flight frequencies compared to the first quarter of 2023, plus the nearly three-month delay in resuming the Dallas flights, Stout said. Those flights were originally on the books to return Feb. 15.

“Had American not made those changes, we would be about 5% higher instead of down about 1%,” Stout said.

And while it’s too early to predict how many passengers will fly through the airport this year, Stout said he is expecting an uptick in passenger traffic in the coming months.

“Based on the summer schedules, from May 1 through August, we’re estimating we’ll be up about 20% in overall (passengers flown) because of the up gauge in aircraft from American, the base operations from Avelo, and increased frequency on routes from Alaska.” As previously reported, Alaska is set to launch nonstop flights to Las Vegas beginning Oct. 1.