Staff photo by Mike Pare / West Star Aviation currently operates out of a 40,000-square-foot hangar at Chattanooga Metropolitan Airport.West Star Aviation
Company has major facilities in East Alton, Ill., and Grand Junction, Colo., with plans to put similar operations in Chattanooga. It has smaller operations in Columbia, S.C.; Aspen, Colo.; Chesterfield, Mo.; and Chicago. The company employs more than 800 people.
Contributed photo / This is a type of plane on which West Star Aviation employees perform repair and maintenance work.A newly recruited aircraft maintenance firm at Lovell Field, already grappling with a hangar full of work, is moving forward on phase one of a multimillion-dollar expansion.
West Star Aviation plans to break ground in October on a 45,000-square foot paint center. That's part of 100,000 square feet of new space it wants to build at the vacant former Air National Guard site at Chattanooga Metropolitan Airport, where it eventually aims to employ up to 250 people, officials said.
"The [existing] hangar the last two months has been full to capacity," said Debi Cunningham, West Star Aviation's vice president of marketing. She said there were recent days when parts of aircraft were sticking out from the hangar due to heavy work loads.
Airport officials are seeking to rezone a parcel of land the airport owns near the National Guard site to help make way for West Star's expansion.
"They're moving forward quicker than they thought," said airport spokesman Albert Waterhouse about West Star.
West Star specializes in the repair and maintenance of air frames, windows and engines, as well as major modifications for private aircraft. The company also handles avionics installation and repair, interior refurbishment, surplus avionics sales, and paint and parts.
Cunningham said West Star has about 35 workers now in Chattanooga and is adding 10 more at its existing 40,000-square-foot hangar. The company bought that facility less than a year ago from Cleveland, Tenn., businessman Allan Jones, chief executive of Jones Management Services.
Cunningham said West Star earlier this summer started hiring for a second shift to reduce customer down time.
The paint center should open in the second quarter of next year, she said. Depending on business, that facility would be followed by a 55,000-square-foot maintenance center that could open in 2018.
West Star said last year it would invest $22.5 million into the existing hangar. Cunningham wouldn't say how much the company would invest into the new facilities but earlier noted those could cost "at least that much or more."
Robert Rasberry, the company's chief executive, said last year that wages for Illinois-based West Star are expected to average about $26 to $27 an hour.
Rasberry said then he expected to see $5 million to $10 million in revenue from Chattanooga in year one, with that going to $25 million to $45 million at the end of five years.
The former Air National Guard site is part of a 13-acre parcel at the airport that is slated to be used for West Star's expansion, officials have said.
The airport included a tract for West Star's planned expansion as part of 23 parcels on the periphery of Lovell Field which it's seeking to rezone to manufacturing.
Waterhouse said the airport acquired the tracts, which are empty, over the years for future expansion projects.
According to the Chattanooga-Hamilton County Regional Planning Agency, the parcels are located on the north side of Hancock Road, along either side of Pinehurst Avenue west of the Pinehurst-Watts Avenue intersection, fronting Brainerd Road between South Chickamauga Creek and Jubilee Drive and on Pine Grove Trail and Portview Circle.
The Regional Planning Agency staff recommended the airport's request be deferred until the September meeting of the planning commission so airport officials can provide more details on proposed uses.
Contact Mike Pare at mpare@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6318.