Textron Aviation departing New Castle Airport
As many as 50 layoffs expected as part of closure, the second major loss at the airport recently
- Textron Aviation plans to close its regional aircraft maintenance at New Castle Airport.
- Firm operates 40,000-square-foot, twin hangars.
- Employees maintain, repair and overhaul Cessna, Citation, Beechcraft, Hawker and King Air aircraft.
New Castle Airport is about to lose another major tenant.
Textron Aviation, formerly Hawker Beechcraft, plans to close its regional aircraft maintenance at Delaware's largest civil airfield – a move expected to result in as many as 50 layoffs.
"In an effort to improve the company’s cost competitiveness, we are taking a number of proactive steps to streamline our business and best position ourselves for the future," the company said in a statement emailed to The News Journal on Monday.
No timeline was given for the closure.
"We'll be working through that transition in the next couple of months," said Textron Aviation spokeswoman Lindsay Adrian.
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Textron, however, has not yet notified the Delaware River & Bay Authority – which operates the New Castle Airport – that it plans to vacate the 40,000-square-foot, twin hangars where its employees maintain, repair and overhaul Cessna, Citation, Beechcraft, Hawker and King Air aircraft.
"That's the rumor," said airport director Stephen Williams when asked about the planned closure. "We have yet to hear anything official from them asking to review their agreement."
The New Castle County facility is one of two service centers Textron Aviation plans to close in the coming weeks, along with a similar center in Atlanta.
The company said both facilities will be "transitioning" to mobile support stations – trucks equipped with maintenance gear that will travel from regional hubs to the clients' hangars. It was unclear Monday whether New Castle Airport will become a regional hub.
In addition to closing two of its 21 support facilities, Textron Aviation also said it will offering be early retirement to some employees. Adrian said some New Castle employees will qualify for the retirement plan, but declined to give specifics.
The loss of Textron Aviation will be the second major blow dealt New Castle Airport in the last year.
Frontier Airlines quietly stopped offering commercial flights in June 2015, leaving Delaware as the only U.S. state with no regularly scheduled passenger airline service. Its departure did not result in the cancellation of any flights because the Denver-based airline already had suspended its last two remaining routes in April – cuts the company initially described as "seasonal."
A few months later, the DRBA put up billboard advertisements in and around New Castle County that consisted of single-sentence messages, such as “An amazing amount of business takes off here,” and “Helping the Delaware economy fly,” laid over images of airplanes or a listing of businesses at the facility.
One includes the words “industry,” “jobs,” “development” and “revenue” underneath the message, “We’re a lot more than just planes.”
The goal, DRBA officials said at the time, was to highlight the airport's role as a home to a wide range of aviation-focused businesses, including Textron Aviation.
The company's aircraft service center first opened in at New Castle Airport in 2012, two years before the financially struggling Hawker Beechcraft was acquired by Textron for a reported $1.4 billion.
Hawker Beechcraft took over what previously had been the operations center for MBNA Bank's fleet of business jets and added a 6,500-square-foot addition.
The move from a temporary service facility at Teterboro Airport in New Jersey was supported by a $750,000 state taxpayer grant from the Delaware Economic Development Office tied to the creation of 100 jobs by mid-2017. At the time, DEDO officials said the company would have to repay the funds – at a rate of $7,500 per job – if that target was not met.
As of last year, the company employed 51 workers at its New Castle Airport site.
Adrian said she is unaware of whether Textron's decision to close its New Castle facility would require some of those funds to be repaid.
DEDO officials said a final decision has not been made.
"The Delaware Economic Development Authority is considering exercising the clawback provisions in the agreement, which could potentially be enforced up to the full amount of the grant," DEDO spokeswoman Christina Dirksen said.
Hawker Beechcraft's taxpayer grant was approved during heady days for the state's economic development office.
The deal came just a week after Fisker Automotive announced plans to hire 120 people as it prepared to begin production of a plug-in hybrid car at the Boxwood Road factory previously owned by General Motors – thanks to $21.5 million in state incentives. The same month, the state also agreed to provide $16.5 million in incentives to Bloom Energy, which promised to create 900 jobs at its fuel-cell factory in Newark.
Fisker never built a car in Delaware, while Bloom Energy was about 700 jobs short of its ultimate hiring goal as of last fall.
Contact business reporter Scott Goss at (302) 324-2281, sgoss@delawareonline.com or on Twitter @ScottGossDel.