international flights, Pan American had 21 departures a week, Japan Airlines (JAL) had five, and Qantas also had five. Southwest/Pacific/Air West Southwest Airways began flying scheduled passenger operations from SFO in 1946 with war surplus C-47s, the military version of the Douglas DC-3. In the late 1950s, Southwest Airways changed its name to Pacific Air Lines, which was based at SFO. In 1959 Pacific Air Lines began flying new Fairchild F-27s from SFO and by 1966 was flying new Boeing 727-100s from the airport. Pacific used the 727 to introduce the first jet service from San Francisco to several cities in California including Bakersfield, Eureka/Arcata, Fresno, Lake Tahoe, Monterey and Santa Barbara. In 1968 Pacific merged with Bonanza Air Lines and West Coast Airlines to form Air West, which also had its headquarters at SFO. West Coast Airlines had served SFO mainly with Douglas DC-9-10s and Fairchild F-27s to Oregon and Washington states. In 1970, Air West was acquired by Howard Hughes who renamed the airline Hughes Airwest, which continued to be based at the airport where it also operated a hub. By the late 1970s, the airline was operating an all-jet fleet of Boeing 727-200, Douglas DC-9-10, and McDonnell Douglas DC-9-30 jetliners serving an extensive route network in the western U.S. with flights to Mexico and western Canada as well. Hughes Airwest was eventually acquired by Minneapolis-based Republic Airlines (1979–1986) in 1980 and the airline's headquarters office at SFO was closed. Jet age The jet age arrived at SFO in March 1959 when TWA introduced Boeing 707-131s nonstop to New York Idlewild Airport (which was renamed JFK Airport in 1963). United then constructed a large maintenance facility in San Francisco for its new Douglas DC-8s, which were also flying nonstop to New York. In July 1959 the first jetway bridge was installed at SFO, one of the first in the United States. On the cover of January 3, 1960, American Airlines timetable contained this message: "NOW! 707 JET FLAGSHIP SERVICE – NONSTOP SAN FRANCISCO – NEW YORK: 2 FLIGHTS DAILY" Also in 1960, Western Airlines was operating "champagne flights" with Boeing 707s and Lockheed L-188 Electras to Los Angeles, Seattle, San Diego and Portland, OR. In 1961 the airport had helicopter service on San Francisco and Oakland Helicopter Airlines (known as SFO Helicopter Airlines, and as SFO Helicopter) with 68 flights a day. Helicopters flew from SFO to downtown