MATS

Acronym of Military Air Transport Service, a consolidation of the US Navy's Naval Air Transport Service (NATS) and the United States Air Force Transport Command (ATC) that functioned from June 1 1948 to January 1, 1966.

Proper noun

  1. Acronym of Military Air Transport Service, a consolidation of the US Navy's Naval Air Transport Service (NATS) and the United States Air Force Transport Command (ATC) that functioned from June 1 1948 to January 1, 1966.
    • At the controls was Capt. Bill Laughlin, a veteran MATS aircraft commander and his chief pilot in the 41st Air Transport Squadron. - 1961 January, T.J. Slaybaugh, “Searched, Sighted, Saved”, in Airman, page 8:
    • I guess I really learned that a long time ago, when MATS first began teaching me, but I had overlooked it lately. - 1961 November, Jan A. Wells, “A Dangerous Attitude”, in The MATS Flyer, volume 8, number 11, page 26:
    • For the first ten years of its existence MATS operate with three major air transport divisions that physically circled the globe. - 1964, Stanley M. Ulanoff, MATS: The Story of the Military Air Transport Service, page...