It started as a 50-employee airline running one major route. One year later, Compass Airlines has served half a million passengers, employs nearly 500 workers and has 17 aircraft flying to 26 cities.

The Chantilly airline was born out of Northwest Airlines’ bankruptcy reorganization. Northwest received federal permission to operate 76-seat regional aircraft instead of just 50-seat planes, and created a new airline to make contract negotiations with pilots flying the larger planes easier. The company bought many of the assets of the former Independence Air to get the airline off the ground a little sooner, President John Bendoraitis said.