SkyWest August traffic and capacity decline

Regional carrier SkyWest Inc. said on Thursday that August traffic on SkyWest Airlines and Atlantic Southeast Airlines fell 8.6 percent compared with August 2007.

Revenue passenger miles _ one paying customer flown one mile _ were 1.54 billion, down from almost 1.7 billion during the same month last year. Capacity, or available seat miles, dropped 7.2 percent to 1.94 billion, from 2.09 billion a year ago.

Load factor _ the percentage of seats filled _ fell 1.2 percentage points to 79.4 percent.

SkyWest regional customers include UAL Corp.'s United Airlines and Delta Air Lines Inc.

For the first eight months of the year SkyWest said revenue passenger miles fell 1.8 percent to 11.84 billion, while capacity fell 0.1 percent to 15.24 billion available seat miles. Occupancy fell 1.3 percentage points to 77.7 percent.

SkyWest shares rose 23 cents to $18.46 in midday trading.