Arrow Air is an American cargo airline based in Miami, Florida, USA. It operates over 90 weekly scheduled cargo flights, and has a strong charter business. Its main base is Miami International Airport.

History

California Origins

Arrow Air founder George Batchelor was born of Native American ancestry in Shawnee, Oklahoma in 1901. He became a pilot, and the loss of his first wife and son in a plane crash did not stop him from moving to Compton, California, in 1947 and establishing Arrow Air. Batchelor's aircraft brokering business was more lucrative than this secondary airline, reported the Miami Herald. In his first deal, Batchelor bought a Douglas DC-3 in Hawaii for $10,000 and resold it for a $15,000 profit. The airline stopped scheduled operations in 1953 in what Batchelor saw as an anti-competitive regulatory environment. However, Batchelor continued leasing aircraft, often with crews, to other small airlines. Batchelor moved Arrow Air to South Florida in 1964. Considered a pioneer in both south Florida's aviation industry and in the Latin American air cargo market, Batchelor would amass a considerable fortune and donate much of it to homeless and children's causes before dying in July 2002.