The Ax Falls

When nonscheduled airlines began to mushroom all over the U.S., airmen predicted that most of the new companies would stay in business only until the Civil Aeronautics Board wielded its regulatory ax (TIME, Feb. 18). Last week the ax fell. Before CAB stops swinging, 95% of the nonscheduled fliers may be grounded.

The lines had been easy to start. Unlike scheduled airlines, they did not have to have a CAB certificate to operate. The Civil Aeronautics Administration estimated that more than 2,730 companies had been formed, usually by veterans. They were operating more than 5,500 planes, almost nine times the total number of planes on scheduled U.S. airlines.

Limit the Trips. Last week CAB ordered all nonscheduled operators to register with the Board. And it defined nonscheduled operations so as to exclude any company which led the public to believe that it was operating regularly between any two points. Example: Trans-Marine Airlines, Inc. had been running regular flights from New York to Cape Cod (TIME, July 16). CAB ordered Trans-Marine to discontinue the operation, warned other lines not to engage in similar practices.

As if this were not enough, the board announced a proposed new regulation which would declare any carrier which makes more than ten trips a month between any two points to be a scheduled operator. This was just what the big airlines, the "scheduled carriers," had asked the board to do. CAB would also forbid all nonscheduled lines from flying outside the U.S. other than to Canada, Alaska or Mexico. The Board will listen to objections to the new regulations. But most airmen knew that the Board's final actions do not often differ much from its "proposals."

Protect a Monopoly? If the proposals stick, most of the lines can stay in business only by trying to get a franchise as a scheduled line. Few had the cash or time to push an application through CAB over the objections of established lines. The cargo business, the new lines grumbled bitterly, would now go to the regularly scheduled lines.

No one doubted that closer control of nonscheduled flying was needed. But too drastic control would almost certainly choke off new competition altogether. Nonscheduled carriers grumbled that the CAB was killing a vigorous young industry in order to protect the monopoly of the established lines. Snapped Sigfried Samuelsson, executive vice president of their trade body, the Institute of Air Transportation: this is "extermination rather than regulation."

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