Posted on April 10, 2019
Service to begin in May
By Madeleine Leroux
Managing Editor
Nearly two years after Southern Airways began flights from El Dorado to Dallas, the airline has announced the addition of daily flights to Memphis, Tennessee, with one-stop service to Nashville, Tennessee.
In a news release issued Tuesday, the airline, which is the only commercial air service provider at South Arkansas Regional Airport, said the daily flights to Memphis International Airport will begin May 2 and tickets are already available. The release noted that the new addition will not affect the daily flights to Dallas that are already offered.
As noted in the release, El Dorado has not had direct flights to Memphis since 2016, when the previous commercial airline that served El Dorado, SeaPort, ceased operations after filing for bankruptcy. SeaPort had offered daily flights to Memphis.
“El Dorado has a long history of airline service to Memphis International, which a prior carrier discontinued several years ago,” Stan Little, chairman and CEO of Southern Airways, said in the release. “We at Southern Airways are delighted to restore their hometown-link to an easterly hub, especially to Southern’s own continuing flights to Nashville International.”
Similar to the Dallas hub, flights to Memphis will allow customers to connect to other flights, both domestic and international. Little said the Memphis hub will offer faster connections to East Cost locations, adding “we now offer a level of connectivity never before seen in El Dorado.”
For those seeking flights to Nashville, the release notes that the timing of the flights from El Dorado to Memphis have been set specifically for a lesser layover time. When looking at flight options at the Southern Airways website, an 11:20 a.m. flight from El Dorado would land in Memphis at 1 p.m., with a Memphis to Nashville flight set for 1:40 p.m.
“Nashville is a booming economy,” Little said. “By offering this fast connection to our Memphis-Nashville service, dubbed ‘The Southern Shuttle,’ we can connect El Dorado to this major U.S. destination.”
Flights to Memphis on the Southern Airways website are priced between $39 and $83, depending on whether the user selects a discount, standard or flexible rate. Flights to Nashville range between $202 and $271.
Southern Airways, which began service out of El Dorado in May 2017, earlier this year reported an increase in passengers using the airport on a monthly basis. In 2018, Southern’s statistics show more than 7,000 passengers who arrived at or departed from the El Dorado Airport, an increase of more than 160 passengers a month from 2017.
For more information about Southern Airways, call the customer service center at 1-800-329-0485 or visit iFlySouthern.com.
Madeleine Leroux can be reached at 870-862-6611 or mleroux@eldoradonews.com.