Home Means Nevada

Southwest Moves Southwest

Few people, even Nevadans know that the state song is entitled "Home Means Nevada." However Southwest Airlines has decided that Nevada would be a good place to call home. Currently more than 400 pilots and crew live in Southern Nevada and Las Vegas is one of the largest, if not the largest ports of call in the Southwest travel itinerary. So it just seemed a natural fit that a decision was recently made to include Las Vegas as a domicile for employees. Of course, Dallas is their first base, and probably Houston is their second base, but by selecting Las Vegas as a base Southwest hit a home run.

I have been a fan of Southwest Airlines since they first began to fly into and out of Las Vegas McCarran International airport. That happened shortly after PSA, the fun-filled low price carrier based out of San Diego was purchased by one of the legacy carriers who immedialtely stripped its routes between Las Vegas and the Left Coast. Las Vegas is just a 40 minute flight from Southern California and over the years Hughes Airwest, Air California, Bonanza, PSA, and a myriad of other carriers offered low fares between the Entertainmant Capital of the World and the Land of Milk and Money.

So it was a welcome relief in 1982 when those Southwest Texans decided that Las Vegas would be a good place to expand with flights from Houston and Phoenix. Since then they've grown to be the largest carrier at McCarran with about 1.5 million passengers per month, nearly double the passenger count of their nearest competitor, US Airways.

With the addition of Las Vegas as a base, Southwest Airlines expects as many as 3,000 employees to call Las Vegas home within the next three years. And that ain't peanuts.

Dr. Forgot