Industry veterans, New Yorkers to head up Delta's continued leadership in the state

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Apr 25, 2016, 10:30 ET

NEW YORK, April 25, 2016 /PRNewswire/ -- Delta Air Lines (NYSE: DAL) has named Henry Kuykendall to Vice President – New York and promoted Chuck Imhof to Vice President – New York Sales to lead the airline's continued dedication to New York as the state's No. 1 carrier.

"Henry and Chuck have been critical to Delta's success in New York and valuable partners in leading remarkable growth and transformation for our airline in the most important market in the world," said Ed Bastian, Delta's incoming CEO. "I am confident that they will continue to build on our many accomplishments and lead our New York team to even higher levels of performance in their new roles."

Since 2011, Kuykendall has served as Delta's Vice President – Airport Customer Service at New York's John F. Kennedy International Airport, where he oversaw a growing Delta network; the May 2013 opening of Delta's $1.2 billion state-of-the-art international gateway at JFK's Terminal 4; and a $175 million second-phase extension of 11 additional gates in January 2015. Prior to his current role, Kuykendall led a team of 4,000 Delta employees at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport. He joined the airline in 1988 and held positions in Airport Operations, Reservations Sales and Corporate Sales earlier in his career.

Imhof joined Delta in 2009 as head of the airline's New York sales team and has since led the growth of key business verticals including entertainment & production, consulting, private equity and banking. These successful account relationships have contributed significantly to an increase in Delta's New York revenue of more than 80 percent since 2010.

Gail Grimmett, Senior Vice President – New York, will join Travel Leaders Group as President of its newly-created Elite Travel Division comprising Protravel International and Tzell Travel Group.

Grimmett was first charged with developing and achieving Delta's key strategic objectives for New York State in 2008. She spearheaded more than $2 billion in infrastructure and customer-experience investments at JFK and LaGuardia airports and presided over the largest hub expansion in 40 years at LaGuardia, doubling Delta's overall capacity out of that airport in 2012. Grimmett joined Delta in 1995 and served in other key leadership roles before moving to New York, including Senior Vice President – Pricing and Yield Management, Chief Economist – Corporate Forecasting, and Managing Director – Investor Relations.

"Gail has truly championed Delta's network, product and operations in New York," said Bastian. "She has demonstrated passion and commitment to our company not only in this market but in myriad other aspects of our business. We are grateful for her leadership and congratulate her on her new role."

Delta Air Lines operates more than 500 peak-day departures to more than 130 destinations worldwide from its hubs at LaGuardia Airport and John F. Kennedy International Airport – including more destinations from New York State than any other airline as well as nonstop service to five continents. Delta's three metropolitan-area airports carried more than 27 million domestic and international passengers in 2015, up from 24 million passengers in 2014. Delta and its nearly 10,000 New York-based employees are part of the fabric of the New York community, acting as the official airline of the Yankees, Mets, Knicks, Rangers, Madison Square Garden, Chelsea Piers, Food Bank for New York City, New York Wine and Food and amfAR, among many others.

About Delta
Delta Air Lines serves nearly 180 million customers each year. In 2016, Delta was named to Fortune's top 50 Most Admired Companies in addition to being named the most admired airline for the fifth time in six years. Additionally, Delta has ranked No.1 in the Business Travel News Annual Airline survey for an unprecedented five consecutive years. With an industry-leading global network, Delta and the Delta Connection carriers offer service to 324 destinations in 58 countries on six continents. Headquartered in Atlanta, Delta employs nearly 80,000 employees worldwide and operates a mainline fleet of more than 800 aircraft. The airline is a founding member of the SkyTeam global alliance and participates in the industry's leading trans-Atlantic joint venture with Air France-KLM and Alitalia as well as a joint venture with Virgin Atlantic. Including its worldwide alliance partners, Delta offers customers more than 15,000 daily flights, with key hubs and markets including Amsterdam, Atlanta, Boston, Detroit, Los Angeles, Minneapolis/St. Paul, New York-JFK and LaGuardia, London-Heathrow, Paris-Charles de Gaulle, Salt Lake City, Seattle and Tokyo-Narita. Delta has invested billions of dollars in airport facilities, global products and services, and technology to enhance the customer experience in the air and on the ground. Additional information is available on the Delta News Hub, as well as delta.com, Twitter @DeltaNewsHub, Google.com/+Delta, Facebook.com/delta and Delta's blog takingoff.delta.com.