Spurs Jet Grounded After NBA Playoff Game

After their series clinching win in the NBA Western Conference Semifinals Monday night, the Spurs had high hopes of flying to Los Angeles to get ready for the next series against the Lakers.

But their hopes were not to be, as they spent the night on their grounded Boeing 727 in New Orleans after beating the Hornets. The plane, operated by Champion Air, was grounded due to maintenance problems.

This all comes as the NBA is scrambling to find other means of transporting the Lakers and the Spurs during the Western Conference finals. Champion Air, which flies 14 NBA teams, including the Lakers and the Spurs, is going out of business and will cease flying at the end of May. Champion was an ideal charter service for the NBA because six of its planes were fitted to have only 59 seats, all first class (I'm sure it's just for their long legs).

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Champion Air the latest victim of fuel prices

Just a week after Aloha Airlines announced it would be shutting down due to high fuel prices, Champion Air is now the latest to fall under the same axe announcing their intentions of ceasing flight operations on May 31st according to a company press release. President and CEO of Champion, Lee Steele, indicated in the release that, “This is a sad day for the entire Champion family,” and a sad end to an 11 year old airline hitting what they claimed to be the "perfect storm" of economic downturn and tight credit. The airline will fulfill any commitments to customers between now and shutdown, but the 550 employees of Champion are undoubtedly already looking for other jobs. I'm not sure what they were expecting with the fuel prices when they operated a 16 aircraft fleet of all 727s. That aircraft could hardly be considered "green" when it comes to fuel consumption.

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