Was it DAL that decided to park the -200's or by any chance was the operation not ran very well by those in charge pre-merger and finally got to a point that it was unrecoverable? I know the timing of the closure can point to DAL closing it but was that REALLY the case? I used to ride the freighters a LOT to get to work and am bummed more than many that they are gone but I hear a lot of folks trashing DAL mgt for doing this when I am of the opinion that the freighters course was set in motion years ago. Even had a chat with a few former middle cargo managers from NWA a couple of years ago who were still trying to keep it around and they were of the same opinion. Also the crews said that after the mechanics were driven out that the reliability fell so the DHL contract was lost, and this started the fall into history.

Not trashing the freighters, they were a valuable business unit to NWA for many years and in my eyes would have continued to make mucho dollars for the combined entity had it been managed properly, but I constantly hear DAL mgt getting trashed for things such as this when many managers from NWA are still around and making decisions too.