2013 Fuel Sales Ended With a Thud in Salina, But Rebound Predicted

Feb. 10, 2014
Flower Aviation of Salina shut down and America Jet sold its fueling division in December. The 106,917 gallons delivered on the airfield last month was a 50 percent decrease from the same month in 2012. The 2013 total of 1.757 million gallons was the lowest since 1985

Jan. 16--That "thud" felt on New Year's Eve was fuel numbers hitting bottom at Salina Regional Airport, Executive Director Tim Rogers told the airport authority board Wednesday morning.

"We ended the year with a thud on fuel sales," Rogers said.

But a rebound is expected.

Flower Aviation of Salina shut down and America Jet sold its fueling division in December. The 106,917 gallons delivered on the airfield last month was a 50 percent decrease from the same month in 2012. The 2013 total of 1.757 million gallons was the lowest since 1985.

The airport authority assesses a fee of 7.45 cents a gallon distributed on the airfield. The airport authority made $128,277 in fuel flowage fees during 2013, which was nearly $73,000 less than expected, according to airport authority records. The fee was raised from 7.22 to 7.45 cents a gallon during the third quarter, Rogers said.

Plenty of traffic

AvFlight, which brought its fixed-base operator business -- and national and international connections as an AvFuel dealer -- to Salina this month, has been busy, Rogers said, although a full month of fuel flowage numbers won't be available until the Feb. 19 meeting.

"We're pleased with the flow of traffic that we've got, but we always want more," said Carl Adkins, the interim Salina AvFlight manager. He attended the airport authority board meeting.

Board members toured the AvFlight Salina facility Wednesday morning and were able to watch the crew fuel a business aircraft, Rogers said.

The Salina air traffic control tower handled 7,001 total aircraft operations -- a takeoff and landing is one operation -- in December, which is 29 percent more than the 5,409 operations in December 2012. The yearly total of 90,131 operations was 7 percent less than in 2012. However, two straight years with more than 90,000 operations will keep the airport in the top 20 percent of all 252 Federal Aviation Administration contract control towers, he said, which helps when federal funding is an issue.

"I'm seeing operations coming back to the airport that I haven't seen in a long time," Rogers told the board.

-- Reporter Tim Unruh can be reached at 822-1419 or by email at [email protected].

Copyright 2014 - The Salina Journal, Kan.