| Airline: | RICO Táxi Aéreo |
| Callsign: | RICO |
| Aoc: | 8,735 - August 2, 2022[1] |
| Headquarters: | Manaus, Brazil |
| Key People: | Átila Yurtsever, Metin Yurtsever, Omer Yurtsever |
RICO Táxi Aéreo LTDA is a Brazilian air taxi company headquartered in Manaus, Amazonas, which offers non-scheduled and charter passenger and cargo flights.
In 1952, the Turkish immigrant Munur Yurtsever, known as Commander Mickey, who worked as an airplane mechanic in Nova Xavantina, Mato Grosso, bought an aircraft and started to fly in the region. The operations consisted of transportation of cargo to gold-mining locations of the region using small aircraft.
During the 1960s, Mickey started a small charter and air taxi company called Taxi Aéreo Rondônia, specialized in flying to gold-mining centers of Rondônia and headquartered in Porto Velho. During the construction of the Trans-Amazonian highway in the 1970s, the company changed its headquarters to Manaus, and provided air services to the big construction companies that were building the highway.
Later, Yurtsever also created RICO – Rondônia Indústria e Comércio, a company that in 1980 would be merged with Taxi Aéreo Rondônia to create RICO Taxi Aéreo.
From 1974 to 1982 RICO Taxi Aéreo maintained a contract with Petrobras to provide air-transportation while it was searching for oil and natural gas in the Amazonian region. At that time, RICO operated 23 Douglas DC-3s being the largest private operator of this type of aircraft in the world.
On 1 November 1996, while maintaining its independent air taxi operations, the owners of Rico Táxi Aéreo created Rico Linhas Aéreas, a regional scheduled airline. This airline ceased operations in 2010. However, air taxi continued.
Rico Linhas Aéreas included the following aircraft configured in all-economy class as of September 2024:[2]
| Aircraft | Quantity | Passengers | Operation | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Embraer EMB 110P1 Bandeirante | 14 | |||
| Embraer EMB 120RT Brasília | 30 | |||
| Cessna Citation 560 XLS | 8 | |||
| Beechcraft King Air B350 | 9 | |||
| Embraer EMB-810C Carajá NE821 | 8 | |||
| Cessna 208A Caravan | 8 Hydroplane 9 Terrain | 1 Hydroplane 1 Terrain | ||