Purdue looks to the skies

The sky was gray, but sunlight reflected off the gold underwings of Southern Airways' commercial plane. In front of the aircraft, gold and silver shovels stood upright for the groundbreaking ceremony about to begin.

“This is symbolic,” Purdue President Mung Chiang said. “Everything about Purdue flies.”

Purdue University Airport and Southern Airways celebrated the beginning of their collaboration to bring commercial air services to the greater Lafayette area, as well as the groundbreaking for the new Amelia Earhart Terminal.

The celebration included speeches from Rob Wynkoop, vice president for auxiliary services at Purdue, Stan Little of Southern Airways Express, Acting Chief of Staff for TSA Myung Kim, President Mung Chiang and former President Mitch Daniels. The groundbreaking and inaugural flight followed shortly.

Wynkoop said the idea to bring back commercial air services came while talking to Daniels and Chief of Staff Gina DelSanto over a beer, specifically Purdue Boiler Gold.

“She (DelSanto) suggested that perhaps now was the time to really begin pursuing the return of commercial air service to Lafayette. That was back in 2017,” he said. “That push from Gina and that idea really started what I would consider a kind of six-year odyssey of sorts.”

Wynkoop said the plan was constantly slowed, specifically by the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

“We didn’t let those things hold us back,” he said. “The interesting thing is that the school and this community through those years also kept pursuing growth and excellence. We were able to tell that story every single time we made a pitch to an airline, inviting them to come see about greater Lafayette, come see about Purdue and the good things happening in our community.”

Southern Airways Express

Chiang gave a special thank you to many people, among them Little.

“The first conversation was about 11 months ago,” Little said. “So in the time span of one year, we’ve gone from talking about, ‘Hey, is anybody interested?’ to having a plane painted, getting TSA on site, renovating the terminal and having this event today.”

As an airline, Southern Airways focuses on smaller planes. The company is interested in cities with a growing population, he said. West Lafayette was the ideal market.

West Lafayette is home to Purdue’s aviation school, which Little described as “unparalleled anywhere in the country.”

He also mentioned Purdue’s airline and airport management programs.

“Those are the airline leaders of tomorrow,” he said. “So someday the CEO of Southern Airways may be somebody who is today a student at Purdue, and I hope we’re able to draw from the talent pool.”

As a commuter airline, each Southern Airways plane holds nine passengers and two pilots. Offering four flights per day, 36 people will be able to fly back and forth from Chicago in a given day.

“I hope that everyone one of them (the flights) is cool,” Little said. “If that’s the case, I hope that we can sometime down the road see two of these airplanes here, and twice as many flights.”

The last time Purdue University Airport flew commercially was 2004. Daniels said commercial flight could return when Purdue could generate enough passengers to sell enough tickets.

“I got one message for you: Buy tickets,” Chiang joked.

So far sales have been good, Little said.

“They were a bit soft early on, but they have really picked up. I think people wanted to wait to make sure this was real,” he said, laughing. “So just in the last few days, we’ve seen a real uptick in tickets.”

Tickets will start around $129. The goal is to price competitively, considering factors like parking fees in Chicago and Uber prices, Little said.

Amelia Earhart Terminal

“This is the home of Amelia Earhart, and momentarily we’ll be breaking ground of a new terminal named after Boilermaker and American, a pioneer, Amelia Earhart,” Chiang said, “who taught here in 1937, by the way.”

After all the remarks, Wynkoop, Little, Daniels and others shoveled scoops of dirt as part of the groundbreaking ceremony.

“What an honor to her (Earhart’s) legacy to have people fly here again,” Myung Kim said. “The airport didn’t return to service on its own. It took a lot of hard work and collaboration, which we are celebrating today.”

Shortly after, officials from Purdue, Southern Airways and the community boarded the plane. The crowd of Purdue alumni, benefactors, aviation students and more watched from the runway as the plane took off for Chicago.

“This time the airport has taken off," Daniels said, "and it’s not coming back down."