Airline Industry

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nately,
ValuJet suffered a string of accidents which brought the future of this air carrier into question.
ValuJet is a low-priced airline that offers inexpensive tickets for regional travel. Based in Atlanta,
the airline serves the Southeastern United States and competes with Continental Airlines as well as with
other small regional carriers. It serves 31 cities primarily in the southeastern United States. The
airline began its service with flights to Tampa and Orlando from Atlanta in 1993. The no-frills strategy
paid off for the fledgling airline, which posted half again as many revenue passenger miles in April 1996
as it did in April 1995. However, the company announced that it was slowing the expansion of its
services, voluntarily, at the same time that it posted this impressive revenue mark (Cole & Pasztor,
1996, p. A6).
Perhaps due to overexpansion or to poor luck, Valujet experienced a series of mishaps in its short
history. In January 1994, a DC-9 skidded off a runway in Washington which resulted in the entire airport
being shut down. In June 1995, a ValuJet flight went through an emergency evacuation after an engine
failed and shrapnel flew into the cabin. Additional inci...