During the height of our early battles to stay in the air, an opportunity presented itself when Southwest Airlines signed an agreement with a local courier company to provide one of our first cargo services between our three original cities. Known as RUSH, or Receives Urgent and Special Handling, the door-to-door courier service was a new way to get important items throughout the state of Texas to their destinations fast. But in addition to promising delivery within five hours, it also offered one additional safeguard—an armed guard.
Shipping goods via airplanes was nothing new to the industry. Many other airlines had established cargo services where shippers could drop off a package at a counter, and its recipient would go over to the airport upon its arrival to claim it. The goal of our partnership with the company known as Security Couriers was to take the service one step further—24 hours a day.
After receiving a call from a Customer, a courier (along with his six-shooter) dispatched by radio would arrive at the shipper’s location for the pickup of the item and saw to its safe keeping all the way onto the aircraft.
When the flight arrived at its destination city, the awaiting courier was there planeside to repeat the process in reverse.
RUSH offered a valuable service to industries such as law, medicine, and financials. Banks could use it to receive loans from the Federal Reserve to cover monies they had “in float.” With a cost of about $200.00 a day per $1,000,000.00 loaned, the $20.00 charge for the service was nothing compared to the potential savings considering the huge sums of monies in transit. And, with the added safety of an armed guard, “stagecoach robberies” could remain a concern of the past.
It also was a potential lifesaver, as well, since it offered medical labs the ability to transport blood or blood samples for immediate transplant or testing elsewhere.
Although RUSH proved to be a short-lived program, it wasn’t our last cargo program to bear the name. In light of the success of companies such as Federal Express, a second attempt was also offered in 1985 under the name “RUSH PLUS” for about two months. Today, RUSH Priority Freight service guarantees delivery within 24 hours, and compliments our Next Flight Guaranteed service “when overnight is overdue.”