If you ask any traveler about their opinion on the worst airline in America and you’ll probably hear rants about Spirit Airlines or Frontier Airlines. Both of these airlines carry reputations for squeezing every possible nickel out of their passengers while subjecting them to an experience that feels no different than being in a flying city bus. Now, after two bankruptcies and a failed bailout from the U.S. government, Spirit Airlines is reportedly preparing to shut down. Many travelers are probably cheering right now, but I will miss the airline of terrible gates and eye-searing jets.
This morning, the Wall Street Journal reported the breaking news that a $500 million deal between Spirit Airlines and the U.S. government has fallen through. With no other entity interested in saving the twice-bankrupt airline, Spirit is reportedly throwing in the towel and is preparing to cease operations. Unless a lifeline arrives in the 11th hour, America will lose one of its cheapest ways to travel great distances.
Update: 3 a.m. CST: Spirit Airlines has ceased operations, releasing this statement:
“It is with great disappointment that on May 2, 2026, Spirit Airlines started an orderly wind-down of our operations, effective immediately. To our Guests: all flights have been cancelled, and customer service is no longer available. We are proud of the impact of our ultra-low-cost model on the industry over the last 34 years and had hoped to serve our Guests for many years to come.”
The original story continues below.
Understandably, there will be a lot of folks who will feel rather elated at the failure of Spirit Airlines. The airline’s tantalizingly cheap tickets came with quirks like expensive upcharges for basically everything, even water. Viral videos of arguments, fights, and other poor behavior aboard Spirit flights didn’t help. But I won’t be cheering. Spirit might have been terrible, but it was also the perfect kind of airline for someone like me.
Cheap Is The Name Of The Game
Spirit Airlines has gone through a lot to end up where it is. The last time I wrote about Spirit’s struggles was in 2024, so let’s go through a quick review to bring you up to speed.
I think the most fascinating part about the Spirit Airlines story is that it didn’t even start life as an airline. It was founded in 1964 as the Clippert Trucking Company. The business would become Ground Air Transfer Inc. in 1974 and then Charter One Airlines in 1983. As Charter One, the airline ran chartered tour flights. It wasn’t until 1992 that Spirit began running scheduled flights, and Spirit didn’t become an Ultra Low-Cost Carrier (ULCC) until 2006.
That part is important because the way that Spirit operates makes it a bit different than an airline like Delta. Here’s what I wrote in 2024:
An Ultra Low-Cost Carrier operates differently than an airline like American or United. The ULCC business model focuses on cutting as much cost as possible. Most ULCCs operate just a single type of aircraft – usually the Boeing 737 or Airbus A320 – and configure each of those aircraft exactly the same with an all-economy configuration. Operating just one type of plane means that everyone, from mechanics to cabin crew, needs to be trained on only one type of plane, further saving costs.
In the past, ULCCs used to fill their fleets with used planes to save money, but now many carriers will just buy lots of new planes in bulk and then sell them for higher prices when they’re just a few years old. That saves the company money and it also benefits the customer since it means the planes usually stay nice and fresh. Well, as nice as a bare-bones all-economy Spirit plane can be. Flying new planes can also be cheaper to operate in the long run since they’re more efficient and may not be as maintenance or training-intensive as an old bird.
ULCCs also have other ways of trimming the fat from their operations. They will often order planes with as few features as possible to cut down on weight. Interiors will also usually be barren with the absolute bare minimum to get people from one destination to another. If you’ve ever flown Spirit or Frontier you know these airlines basically put glorified bus seats in their planes and your only luxury is a tiny tray table. The airline doesn’t even try making the seats look pretty. Frontier doesn’t even offer Wi-Fi, citing costs and the weight of carrying the equipment in each aircraft.
To be clear, public transit is great and there should be buses for all who want them. But far too many transit buses have rock-hard seats for their passengers, and it almost feels like Spirit copied them.
ULCCs have other clever ways to reduce their operating costs. They’ll fly to airports with cheaper fees and utilize mobile stairs whenever possible instead of paying to use a jet bridge at a gate. Aside from paying their employees less, ULCCs also often make their employees do multiple jobs. I have been on multiple Spirit flights where the gate agent was also a flight attendant, which isn’t as common in other airline models.
If you’ve flown on an ULCC like Spirit Airlines or Frontier Airlines, you might have also noticed that they get the worst possible gates. For example, it’s common for Spirit and Frontier to use Chicago O’Hare’s international terminal for both departures and arrivals. If you’re unlucky enough to score a Frontier flight that leaves O’Hare, you have to leg it to nearby Midway.
Basically, ULCCs like Spirit Airlines and Frontier Airlines are meticulously crafted to spend the least money possible. The benefit is that these airlines can often offer base fares so cheap that no other form of transportation can even compete. Spirit advertises a base fare as low as $25. However, add bag fees and all of the micro fees together and it can be more expensive than a big airline.
Making you pay for bags and snacks isn’t the only way a ULCC will jack up the price of airfare. The Spirit Airlines of recent years has been criticized for turning to microtransactions to pad its bottom line. For example, it used to be free to walk up to a kiosk at the terminal and print your boarding pass. Now, it costs $2. If you want a human to do it, you’ll have to spend $10. Frontier’s fee is even more insulting at $25 to have an airport agent print it for you.
Now, most airline passengers are used to flying with digital boarding passes and thus, will avoid these fees. However, not everyone is tech-savvy. If you aren’t, these airlines say, you have to pay up. Spirit Airlines won’t even let you have a cup of room-temperature water for free anymore.
Spirit Made Bank, Until It Didn’t
Despite all of the hate, the upcharges, the complaints, and the late flights, the models used by Spirit Airlines and Frontier worked for a while. Spirit Airlines raked in cash, recording profits solidly in the hundreds of millions every single year until 2019. At their peak, ULCCs raked in more per dollar of sales than big airlines. The COVID-19 pandemic dealt a blow to airlines as travel demand plummeted. As CNN reported, America’s airlines collectively burned billions of dollars during the first two years of the pandemic, and that was despite billions coming from the federal government in the form of grants and another $21.2 billion in loans.
Then something a bit weird happened. Traffic demand rebounded, and most airlines recovered. But Spirit Airlines did not. According to VOA in 2024, Spirit had lost $2.5 billion since the beginning of 2020 and had another $1 billion in debt payments coming due by 2025.
What happened? One major curveball was that the big airlines wanted a slice of the budget market and started offering their own super-cheap base fares. Then, Spirit was hit by an engine recall from Pratt & Whitney, which left its aircraft grounded, unable to make money. In 2024, Spirit flew more passengers than it did before the pandemic, but those passengers were paying 10 percent less per mile, and Spirit made 20 percent less revenue per mile. So, flying more passengers alone didn’t help.
Frontier tried to merge with Spirit, but was outbid by JetBlue. The Justice Department blocked the JetBlue deal, which worsened conditions for Spirit. Click here to read more from my report.
In 2024, Spirit Airlines filed for Chapter 11 Bankruptcy in November 2024. This wasn’t the end, but a restructuring. Airline bankruptcies are common in America. In the past 27 years, American Airlines, United Airlines, and Delta Air Lines all had bankruptcies. American’s bankruptcy was only 15 years ago. Usually, the airline makes a bunch of changes and cuts, straightens up, and flies right again. It’s common for an airline to go bankrupt, restructure, and come out of the other end stronger. But that isn’t what happened with Spirit.
During its first bankruptcy, Spirit said it burned $1.2 billion and was out of cash. Spirit emerged from its first bankruptcy in March 2025, stating:
Spirit Aviation Holdings, Inc., parent company of Spirit Airlines, LLC, (“Spirit” or the “Company”) today announced that Spirit has emerged from its financial restructuring, completing a consensual, deleveraging transaction that equitizes approximately $795 million of funded debt. With significantly less debt and greater financial flexibility, Spirit emerges as a stronger company better positioned for long-term success.
As part of the restructuring, the Company has also received a $350 million equity investment from existing investors to support Spirit’s future initiatives, including investments to provide Guests with enhanced travel experiences and greater value. Spirit’s Plan of Reorganization was confirmed by the United States Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York, with overwhelming support from a supermajority of the Company’s loyalty and convertible noteholders.
Then, Spirit fell apart again and had to file for bankruptcy a second time. In August 2025, Spirit found itself back in court, filing another Chapter 11, and asking for help again. Here’s how that went, from CNBC:
Spirit Airlines won approval for a $475 million lifeline and a $150 million payment from its biggest aircraft lessor in court on Friday, as the struggling budget airline races to stabilize itself after its second bankruptcy since November.
U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Southern District of New York approved the $475 million in debtor-in-possession financing, a lifeline that bankrupt companies can use to continue operating, along with $150 million from AerCap and the rejection of 27 airplane leases. Spirit said on Friday that $200 million would be immediately available for the carrier.
Spirit has been cutting dozens of routes, announced plans to slash its fleet, and last month said it would furlough about one third of its flight attendants to cut costs. The airline is in talks with its pilots’ union and is seeking about $100 million in cuts from that group.
The Spirit Airlines shrinkage was dramatic. In April 2024, the airline had 25,000 scheduled flights. This April, it had only 12,000 scheduled flights. But the airline just couldn’t arrest its descent. Spirit, like other airlines, is getting hammered by higher fuel costs due to the war with Iran. Spirit planned to spend $2.24 per gallon of jet fuel this year, while current prices are a little over double that.
But unlike other airlines, Spirit just didn’t have any buffer for surprises. Worsening Spirit’s condition is that other airlines have been rushing to fill the gaps left behind by Spirit’s heavy cuts.
A twist in the Spirit story came in April when the Trump Administration entered talks with Spirit and its creditors for a potential rescue package. Trump wanted to give the airline $500 million in exchange for a 90 percent stake in the airline, effectively making the U.S. government the majority owner of the airline.
As CNBC reported, Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was against the idea, as were some lawmakers and some of Spirit’s own bondholders. The Trump Administration wasn’t even sure how it would fund the deal. Then, the government also hit an impasse with Spirit’s creditors.
According to the New York Times, Spirit’s creditors believed having the government take control of 90 percent of the airline would put them in an even worse position if Spirit failed after the rescue package. So, the deal has apparently fallen through, and reportedly, Spirit Airlines is preparing to cease operations. According to Reuters, some other airlines think that Spirit won’t even survive the weekend and are preparing to take on Spirit’s passengers.
Meanwhile, Trump has reportedly sent one last proposal to Spirit and its creditors in hopes of getting a deal. If the deal isn’t taken, Spirit will likely fade away from American skies, and quickly. That makes me sad.
I’ll Miss Spirit Airlines
Yes, I just spent so many words absolutely trashing Spirit. I strongly dislike Spirit’s upcharges, its performance, its lack of comfort, and its seeming disdain for its own passengers. Flying Spirit really does feel like you’re boarding a city bus that calls itself an Airbus A320. But you know what? Spirit is awesome in just the right situation.
As most of our readers know, I am a serial cheapskate. With rare exceptions, I usually buy the cheapest, most depreciated versions of my dream cars. Getting the best deal sometimes means having to fly somewhere to pick that car up. The only way this works out financially is because Spirit and Frontier offer ludicrously cheap base fares.
When a dealership in California gave me a sweetheart deal on a new 2016 Smart Fortwo Edition #1, I had to fly out there to pick it up. It was my first time flying in my whole life. I paid Frontier about $50 to fly from Chicago to Los Angeles aboard “Fallon The Falcon,” then a factory-fresh Airbus A321. An Uber ride to the airport costs more than that!
In 2017, someone gave me a Smart entirely for free on the condition that I drove it home. I paid a whopping $31 to Spirit Airlines, which got me from Chicago to Denver. You can’t even fill a car’s gas tank for that price nowadays. I paid these base fares, too, because when I go on trips to buy cars, I fly with nothing more than what I can fit in my purse. So I don’t bring a carry-on or anything else that would trigger an upcharge.
These stupidly cheap fares mean that people who don’t have the cash for even a normal economy seat can fly vast distances for less than what Amtrak or Greyhound charges. Spirit also has a stellar safety record with zero hull losses or fatalities in its entire history.
I won’t say the flying experiences have been nice. Frontier Airlines has canceled more flights for me than I can remember. In 2022, Frontier left me stranded in California for days because of an operational meltdown. While Spirit hasn’t canceled that many flights for me, it has the problem of rarely really getting me to my destination on time. The seats in the Airbus aircraft of Frontier and Spirit are so hard that my butt hurts just thinking about it.
Yet, when I just need to get from A to B with exactly zero frills, Spirit’s website is the first place that I visit. When United Airlines tells me to cough up $400 for a ticket, I know Spirit is probably going to want only $120 for that same flight. When I just want to get from one place to another, I appreciate that.
The Impact Of Spirit Failing
I’m not really sure what’s going to happen in a post-Spirit world. The immediate impact is going to be a lot of hardship for hard-working Americans. Spirit Airlines employs around 9,500 full-time workers and around 17,000 people if you count contractors. All of them could be out of work before the weekend is out. That’s devastating, especially at a time like right now when people are already struggling.
Anyone planning to fly Spirit home may find themselves without a ride, which is also terrible. Any points you accrued with Spirit would be worthless, and you’ll have to beg for a refund on any ticket you currently have. It is never a good thing when an airline shutters, even an airline that people hate.
It’s also unclear what budget flying will look like in a post-Spirit world. Chances are, if Frontier, JetBlue, or Southwest aren’t flying where you’re going or their fares aren’t cheap enough, you’re going to have to cough up more dough to fly. This will be even worse in cities where Spirit held a high market share, like Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Reportedly, Spirit has a 27 percent share of the market there.
Yet, I also know that a lot of people aren’t going to miss Spirit. They won’t miss the delays, the microtransactions, the poor behavior on flights, or the hard seats. But I will. I’m going to pour one out for the big sky taxi.
Top photo: Spirit
There are people who miss things like Olive Loaf, Jello Aspic, Pee Chee school folders and Amway.
Spirit deserves to join them in the dustbin of history.
Here is a corporate-speak load of nonsense:
“…on May 2, 2026, Spirit Airlines started an orderly wind-down of our operations, effective immediately. To our Guests: all flights have been cancelled, and customer service is no longer available.”
“Orderly wind-down” somehow means immediately ceasing all operations, and if you are expecting us to fly you back home, eff you, we just quit, turned off the lights, shut the doors and went home.
Oh, and to our employees, eff you too, on Monday go sign up for unemployment.
I will miss it calling it the school bus of the skies.
I flew 3 hours home on a full airplane from Las Vegas on Spirit with only one working bathroom in the rear of the plane. The worst part was I had an aisle seat in the last row.
Only flew Spirit a few times. I think I made it to my destination without delay, the rest of the experience was kinda demeaning and the cost savings are certainly overstated.
I’ve been thinking about this since it happened. Before the airline deregulation of the 1970s, flying was for the rich. They liked it that way. But with deregulation, now poor people could fly and they made airports crowded with poor people. And the rich people didn’t like that, so they created their own private lounges so they could wait for their flights without having to intermingle with the Walmart crowd. I’m sure rich people are very happy with the demise of ULCC.
Sarcasm? maybe, maybe not.
I’ve been in one of the private lounges once, at O’Hare. It was an experience. Free food and booze without limits. Private cubicles for those wishing to work. Literal team conference rooms.
Being poor, lower middle class, kid, the thought of flying was so beyond my ken it was a totally aspirational idea. The right crowd and no crowding. Out on my own, married w/ couple of kids, living paycheck to paycheck, I remember that a flight from California to Omaha was about $450/seat back when a dollar was worth 75¢. You did get a nice snack though.
So Mercedes…when you are buying one of their planes at auction? Ha ha
“You won’t believe how cheap I got this shitbox Spirit plane at auction!”
i wonder how long the planes will haunt the tarmac what with all that unfinished business and all.
seriously though, they always seemed to have a crap ton of birds in the air going by my area on sky cards.
Someone will buy them and get them in the air. I haven’t been in a plane in the last year with more than a handful of empty seats. Most have been 100% full.
Hopefully they will replace the awful seats first.
Hopefully not. Spirit’s fixed seats without recline is the only good thing about the airline. It would be nice to see that trend across other economy classes.
I expected most of them to end up in the desert, owned by lessors, waiting for another carrier to pick them up…but it sounds like many of them will be scrapped. Which sounds insane as their fleet was pretty new. Those GTF engines are a huge problem and I assume they (AerCap, not Spirit) can get a pretty penny parting out the engines and airframes.
I flew on spirit once, an it was fun in that being stuck in a subway car full of goats under the east river for a couple hours with only a bagpiper for entertainment on a first date.
It was an entertaining adventure that made a good story, but once was enough.
Spirit Airlines the Celebrity Cruise Line of the skys. It is hard to cut costs when you have already cut everything but wings. I am surprised they budget $2.27 a gallon for jet fuel, that is cheaper than regular gas, I used to mix jet fuel with high octane just to get the required level in my car and it was usually $2 more than regular. Hard seats were probably back seat cop car seats uncomfortable but hose out easy to clean. The big boys hopped in just to put the kids out of business it won’t be long before they hike the fares and someone new brings this plan back
Negotions are ongoing for The Trump Organization (not the government) to purchase Spirit Airlines. It would move upmarket & offer first class and business class fares and experience. Florida hub. Fewer routes and scheduled flights.
A reboot of Trump Shuttle would certainly be interesting.
What a fiasco that was.
“Interesting” is an interesting way to describe a reboot of Trump Shuttle. The Golden Goose Shuttle ran for only 3 years between NYC, Boston, and DC and was never profitable. I wouldn’t have wished a fate such as that upon the approximately 17,000 employees of Spirit who are now unemployed. Spirit, which has been in existence since 1983, had a business model which was successful enough to make them the 7th largest air carrier in North America at one point in time. Covid drastically reduced the passenger count, which was a major blow for a low cost / low profit per seat sold airline, that eventually twice forced the company into bankruptcy. Spirit would likely have come out of bankruptcy this year, then the war with Iran was started so the big oil companies could pad their deep pockets. Fuel cost coupled with the bankruptcies and profitability problems left the company where it is today; gone. Trump leaves his
markstain on everything he touches, and the crap just rolls down hill.My wording was quite intentional. 😉 Reviving Spirit as a luxury airline specifically for people who like Trump seems like a great way to burn a crazy amount of money. Even if this hypothetical airline had the same routes as the big airlines, which it wouldn’t, it would be starting out with at least half its potential customers not even interested.
I was going to reply to this article yesterday that the current administration would somehow blame this on the previous administration.
Turns out I should have, because they did.
Hi Mercedes, I did get that your wording was intentional and got quite a chuckle when I read that. I hope you took no offense to the wording of my reply, as the only offense of my post was directed at Der Fuehrer, his ilk, and the damage they have caused to both the American and World economies and populace.
The thought of the livery on a Trump Aircraft gives me nightmares
Over half the nation would do their best to avoid flying a Trump ventured airline. People already avoided Spirit.
What a great idea. (eyeroll)
I think that we are past the tipping point and that even fewer than 50% would get on anything with that stank on it…
………The article says in 1 place that Spirit was all economy. Not true. Big Front Seat was a 1st class seat. For a whole ~ $30-40 more. Worth every nickel. My problem with spirit was limited flights per day. Bad times. (i aint taking off at 6am or 11pm- no.). 45 minumte wait at baggage claim. Now we are forced to us a major and up the ante ~~~$300-400. BRUTAL. PS- i m not flying Southwest;s tiny ass seats. Never
The Big Front Seat might have been “First Class” for Spirit, but in terms of actual content, it was premium economy with a recliner on top.
Sucks for people to lose jobs, but this is the free market that is apparently our Lord and Savior. Bad businesses fail. Spirit was run poorly, and so the people who ran it poorly deserve to go out of business and have all of the people who relied on them for their business acumen to be angry with them, and also to have a stain on their resumes as executives, instead of the more common failing upward. I’m actually shocked that there wasn’t a “too big to fail” bail out, because I just expect that businesses of a certain size will be able to socialize the losses while they privatize the profits, same as it ever was. Amen. Let’s all make the sign of the cross now.
Oh you sweet summer child, executives only fall upwards.
I’m aware! And the obscenely wealthy are idiots who are treated like oracles.
My oath is that if I win the the lottery, (I rarely play) I will become a ghost. I don’t need much to be fulfilled.
I can get behind this. Hey, let’s all create a barter economy. All the rich people are creating bitcoin as a separate currency; so they won’t have to participate in things such as “taxes,” or “regulations,” or even “law.”
There’s nothing that says we MUST participate with money.
I will certainly miss Spirit. My local airport, Arnold Palmer (LBE) in Latrobe, PA has only one commercial carrier and has just done a multi-million dollar expansion. Spirit has just made it a ghost town. They’ve been trying to get a carrier other than Spirit for several years with no takers.
Howdy neighbor, fellow Westmoreland County resident.
Actually never flown out of Palmer, the last time I flew Spirit (8 or 9 years ago) the flights from PIT made more sense for me.
Out around Indiana PA neighbors I usually drove past Arnies Airport in favor of Pittsburgh as Spirit never went where I wanted to go and flights involving 2 or more airlines has never worked for me
Pittsburgh here; never flew from there but took a Spirit trip years ago to LA. No complaints, they got me there on time and with my luggage and was definitely cheaper than the other airlines. Where they lost me was when I went to book a flight to FL down the road, I *thought* I had points with them, but apparently if you didn’t fly within a year of your last trip with them, you lost ALL points. Swore to never fly them again and stuck with Southwest, where to this day, I still have all points I’ve made with them, flying or not.
Spirit worked for me for short hops to FL or so with little luggage. Soon as you started adding luggage, etc American or Delta made more sense.
Is there still a good restaurant at the airport? I was there too many years ago now and saw a private plane land and a van drove up to it so you couldn’t see the passengers. The tail number on the plane was nAP1 or something similar, so I asked the waitress do you think that’s Arnold Palmer’s plane, and she is like yes – he is in the dining room having dinner. That town loved their Arnold Palmer.
Yes, DeNunzio’s is still there and say they’re not cutting their hours. Great Italian food plus, steaks, pizza, and a bar.
I feel I must point out the obvious: Spirit did not fail because it was a ULCC; they failed because they were a extremely poorly run and managed airline.
If you can’t keep schedule, if you treat your customers like crap, and if all this keeps you from being profitable, then your business will fail, regardless of what kind of airline (or business) you run and manage.
The ULCC model can be made to work (e.g. Southwest, Ryanair, others…), with service that makes customers happy (e.g. Southwest). And the ULCCs are needed in the airline ecosystem for those customers whose use case aligns with them. Their existence improves the industry (at least, indirectly) for all (customers and providers alike).
I feel really sad for those who lost their jobs last night, and to those customers who are now stranded and dealing with the cost and hassle of rearranging their travel plans. But any business being run this poorly needs to go away.
Current administration: We have too much government!
Also: Let’s buy an airline!
Where is the logic?
There is no logic. Incompetence leaves no room for logical thought.
Trump once owned an airline. He just wanted another go at it. This guy really doesn’t understand what his current job is. He’s completely irrational.
One man’s “no room for logical thought” is another man’s “freed from the chains of reality”.
I believe the logic was to offer them a bait and switch so that they would be in a worse position that would make a takeover by Trump’s private side that much more appealing. I doubt that the government offer was ever legitimate. Now he’ll be able to pick it up for half-pennies on the dollar.
I flew a bunch from childhood through my late 20’s. Since 2009 I have only flown once, it was a few years ago from Chicago to Dallas and back for a quick weekend trip. I took Spirit, paid a few extra bucks for “The Big Seat” up front, and nothing else. I don’t need WiFi or shitty snacks, but having way more room than I would have on a more expensive coach seat on a major carrier was an incredible luxury. My flights, both first of the day, were on time. It was a great experience. Way better than all those cramped coach seats I used to jam my fat ass into on United. IDAF that the floor was rubber instead of carpet.
I’d rather NOT have carpet myself in vehicles. While I get the history of why we have carpet in our cars, I’d never understood it – it’s a tool for doing something, not a living room. I’d be very happy to be able to basically sweep out small amounts of dirt vs getting out the vacuum.
one of the things i loved about my JKU. i pulled the carpet, left the rubber floor mats. if it got really bad, pull the drain plugs and hose her out.
One of the first things I do when I buy a car is get Weather Tech style floor mats that cover everything. I don’t want to see carpet. I live in a place that gets lots of snow in the winter, so I don’t want the carpet soaking up salty slush and getting moist and gross.
Making it that long as an airline, let alone a cut rate airline, without any major accidents is actually quite an accomplishment. The business model of rapidly turning over new aircraft kept them out of the Valuejet danger zone of operating clapped out old planes while also trying to cut corners on maintenance.
I actually think that budget airlines will want to make sure there are no incidents, because a serious incident could be the end of the airline, as people would naturally think, “see, flying with these cheap airlines is dangerous”. If British Airlines or Lufthansa has an incident, people will say, “well, it can happen to the best of them”. Flying only brand-new aircraft of course helps with this.
Interesting so you feel the big airlines are fine with the occasional crashes? They aren’t cheap and you lose a multiple million dollar airplane.
Take an airline like Lufthansa. Probably one of the most-well-regarded airlines on the planet. They had lots of incidents, including hull losses and fatalities. Is it a problem? No. Everybody just shrugs it off. Imagine if that happened to Easyjet or Ryanair. That would be the end.
Of course no airline wants a hull loss, and just looking at the financial aspect is kind of cynical, but once you had a few, and people still trust you, another one isn’t as big a deal as with a ultra-low-budget airline that has its first hull loss with fatalities.
For many, Spirit was *not* cheaper; it just appeared so.Yes, if you just need to get from A to B with no luggage, Spirit can save you money (as long as you’re willing to be treated like crap on the journey). But if you actually need any baggage with you, you’ll probably pay more. When I was still working and we had to book travel, we were supposed to use Spirit unless we could show a reason for Delta. After taking Spirit once and paying *more* than the others on my team on Delta, thanks to just having bags, it was easy to prove. So while I lament the loss of jobs, I don’t regret the passing of the company.
If the ULCC model is still viable, some entity will fill the void. If it is not viable, another unsustainable corporate model will die. I am not sure most people will care.
IMO, the only good part of flying is being in the air. Everything else is just garbage.
I’m sure there are some people at Southwest and Frontier working overtime this weekend to see which routes they can expand to to make a profit. And to discuss if buying the planes and hiring the workers is a good idea.
I’m with Mercedes on this. Everyone loves to beat down the ULCCs until they see the same route on American for $400 more. I fly on my own dime to accommodate a work situation that lets me travel between two residences. I use Frontier twice a month for the commute. I fly hobo class, just my laptop bag. So I don’t care that a carryon costs more than the flight itself. The airport is a small regional dumpy airport on one end, but who cares? The seats are uncomfortable compared to an upper level carrier, but it’s a two hour flight.
I’m just not a flying snob. I recently took Spirit for a work trip because the flight times were more convenient. It was fine.
My caveat is this. Over the past three years and probably over 60 flights on ULCCCs , it’s fine nearly every time. It’s pretty similar to most airlines. But when it goes sideways, you’re in a lot more trouble. Customer service is stretched thin, and there’s fewer ways to accommodate you. I got bumped from a Frontier flight by a flight crew deadheading once in Orlando. I watched them get on the plane before they told five of us that, nah we can’t let you on. Next flight was the next morning. So I asked for a hotel. No, because my drivers license says Florida, and the rule is they won’t put you up. Nevermind that I lived an hour away. I walked downstairs to American and bought a flight that leaves a couple hours later for $200. Frontier did refund the $48 for my flight.
Ryanair will go even a step further and not even use mobile stairs, using the built-in stairs of their 737 jets.
Yeah, reading this, I immediately thought about how U.S. ULCCs are nothing compared with the chintziness of Ryanair. And I say that at least a tiny bit fondly.
They are generally called “Crying Air” for a reason.
Stairs?!? We don’t need no stinking stairs! Deploy the slides!
Slides are no good getting passengers on board, and I would guess that deploying them is really expensive.
They’re great for getting people onboard! Have you ever watched a bunch of adults climb one of those inflatable obstacle courses? Hilarious!
Pour one out for the YellowHound. I will no longer be able to be amused looking at their clientele. At one of my home airports, their gates were right across from American’s, and there were things to be seen on par with Walmartians getting on those airplanes. And occasionally, a good entertaining argument with the gate agent. They should have had popcorn, but it would have been more expensive than a movie theater.
Personally, I am paid WAAAAY too much and have WAAAAY too many FF miles to ever consider flying the likes of these airlines. Not even for free. Literally every single year Spirit would be in the local news for stranding hundreds and hundreds of passengers for DAYS here in God’s Waiting Room, FL when the thunderstorms roll through and cancel tons of flights. They had zero capacity for getting people out given the limited flights and routes. And they sure as Hell weren’t going to pay for anybody to fly on another airline.
So that is what was great about Spirit. It let people who are on business and higher money travel have a nice flight on a regular airline. All those folks you are maligning (maybe correctly) will now be on YOUR flight. This is a lose-lose situation. Not sure it benefits anyone.
No they won’t – they can’t afford the airfare.
yes and no, credit cards are a helluva drug. You’ve seen the disney adults 80k in cc debt who keep going 5 times a year. I believe you’re correct with the casual “lets pop to beach for the weekend!” crew.
The “let’s pop to the beach for the weekend” crew was literally their ENTIRE market here. Those people are not going to pay what it takes to fly the majors on a whim. The dichotomy of flying here is that if you are planning a vacation months in advance it’s very cheap, if you need to fly relatively last minute (I’m typically flying with about a week’s notice for work, maybe two at best) hold on to your wallet FAR more than elsewhere – because all those vacationers have already bought all the cheap tickets.
The people I saw boarding the YellowHounds did not look like long-term planners. Like seriously – go to an urbanish Walmart at 11pm – same crowd. You actually need a certain amount of wherewithall to be able to get 80K in credit card debt. These very much looked like the debit card only crowd.
If you just keep paying off the card with another 0 balance card then use both until maxed out and getting a new 0 balance card and pay the others off you credit limit grows great. If you just have one card and pay it off every month or no card your credit limit and score suck
I have paid off every credit card every month for more than 15 years now. I mostly just use one card, though I do have several. I also had no mortgage and no car loans the past 4 years or so. I had an 840 credit score until I ran up the balances on my HELOCs to build the new house the past six months. Now I have an 828, the horror. And they keep increasing the credit limit on that card (and the rest). At this point I could buy a median priced car on it, if a dealership would let me. Credit limits are a function of both credit score and income… Those Spirit flyers were not going to have massive credit limits. I could see some of my fellow AA flyers in first class being deep in credit card debt though to keep up that upper-middle-class lifestyle.
No card means no credit history, so yes, that will kill your score. At the end of the day, they want to see you using and paying credit responsibly over time. ALL it measures is how likely you are to pay it back. But that correllates statistically with all sorts of other life issues. If you can’t pay your debts responsibly, chances are you are irresponsible in lots of other areas of life. So it gets used for all sorts of things not related to borrowing money, rightly or wrongly.
This is my argument for public transit – the more people we get onto subways, trains, and busses the better- leaves more room on the highway for me. We underfund public transit and we should spend more to get more cars off the road.
hear hear!
Full ground stop as of midnight EST 🙁
If I took the time I spend reading The Autopian every year, and devoted it to arguing with Spirit Airlines and waiting for their flight delays … I could save hundreds of dollars per year on air travel.