Passenger Trains > OT: Spirit Airlines Shuts Down

I suppose this is a final epilogue to Todd's brainstorm post regarding the, as we now know, failed proposal by the government to nationalize Spirit as part of a bailout. 

The company could not, apparently, bridge disagreements between their creditors and the government over the terms of the governments bailout proposal. At 2:23am this morning the company finally confirmed reporting by major outlets including WSJ that they were shutting down. The final flight to land was Flight 1833 at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport, which arrived at approximately 1:09am from Detroit, the city where they began operations in 1990.

Most other airlines are pitching in to offer "rescue" fares or flights for psssengers who have been affected. I expect Amtrak will be picking up at least a little of the slack over the next week or so in some markets. 

The low cost sector will carry on with Frontier and several smaller low cost airlines but the skies over this continent are definitely going to be less colorful now.

The infinite wisdom of not allowing Spirit and Jet Blue to combine due to "competitive concerns" has resulted in exactly the same number of carriers there would have been had the merger been approved.  The difference is that now there are fewer flights due to the shutdown of Spirit, and that would NOT have been the case had the merger moved forward.  Fewer seats in the network means higher fares.

Good job, Feds.

Chessie1963 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The infinite wisdom of not allowing Spirit and Jet
> Blue to combine due to "competitive concerns" has
> resulted in exactly the same number of carriers
> there would have been had the merger been
> approved.  The difference is that now there are
> fewer flights due to the shutdown of Spirit, and
> that would NOT have been the case had the merger
> moved forward.  Fewer seats in the network means
> higher fares.
>
> Good job, Feds.

Yea, well, I'd bet the mortgage that the Spirit-Jet Blue merger was turned down for 100% political reasons, and nothng else.  Bad blood between people. 
OTOH, IDK why ppl even start "discount, low fare airlines".  The joke in the aviation biz , that been around forever, is that the way to make a small fortune in the airline biz, is to start with a big one.  Its usually someone with a big ego who just "wants to own an airline".  Almost every low cost carrier has failed.  The list is unbelievably long.    The big guys learned how to kill competition, not the least of which was using the loyalty programs.
Spirit ended up with a bad reputation too...nickel and diming to death.  "Oh, you want a glass of water, that's be extra" 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/26 08:26 by pdt.

I flew Spirit once and the experience was a disaster -- same with Frontier.  You get what you pay for.

-John

The ever-vigilant government disapproved the Spirit - Jet Blue merger noting it would,  "hinder competition".  I wonder, as a very astute colleague of mine in the aviation industry pointed out, how the shutdown of Spirit now improves competition?

Agreed!  I have flown both Spirit and Frontier and would never fly with either of them again.  Good riddance...I just feel sorry for the employees. No frills airline now gone!  

jcaestecker Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I flew Spirit once and the experience was a
> disaster -- same with Frontier.  You get what you
> pay for.
>
> -John

a737flyer Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The ever-vigilant government disapproved the
> Spirit - Jet Blue merger noting it would,
>  "hinder competition".  I wonder, as a very
> astute colleague of mine in the aviation industry
> pointed out, how the shutdown of Spirit now
> improves competition?

In theory, Spirit's aircraft will be sold off or returned to lenders, and Spirit's trained and experienced flight and ground crews will seek work in the industry. A new discount airline will likely emerge somewhere, and provide services in some markets.  Same thing which happened when Trump Airlines, Braniff, Eastern,  and others went into bankruptcy.

Here in Florida, Breeze Airways provides services between second tier airports in the US,  Avelo Airways provides services out of Lakeland for as low as $39.  Breeze was founded by David Neeleman and various investors. He was a founder of JetBlue and Gol.

Chessie1963 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The infinite wisdom of not allowing Spirit and Jet
> Blue to combine due to "competitive concerns" has
> resulted in exactly the same number of carriers
> there would have been had the merger been
> approved.

While I'm definitely not your TO airline foamer, I was looking back 40+ years. The days when People Express was all the excitement, Pan Am, Northwest, and Eastern were still relevant. Only notable survivor from the "new" discount airlines from the 1980s is Southwest. They took over some routes from PSA (Pacific Southwest Airlines --> US Air which became part of American) and "grew" by demise of other airlines.

I had to ramble to make the point that airline industry goes through cycles, and looks like the cycle is repeating, with different names of course.

I also looked at the histories of Spirit and JetBlue. I also looked at their fleets, and have a "conspiracy theory" on the primary motive, which I'll refuse to elaborate. There's a suspiciously hidden motive behind the "disapproval", yet no political accusation from the TO kangaroo court. I'm laughing at the pathetic bias.

Competition? LOL. While no U.S. carrier has been convicted of collusion, there have been accusations before, most notably 11 years ago. Higher fares, blah blah.

I feel sorry for the passengers who booked Spirit whose travel plans have been disrupted. But the airline industry will be OK, as we repeat another cycle.
 

Lackawanna484 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> In theory, Spirit's aircraft will be sold off or
> returned to lenders, and Spirit's trained and
> experienced flight and ground crews will seek work
> in the industry. A new discount airline will
> likely emerge somewhere, and provide services in
> some markets.  Same thing which happened when
> Trump Airlines, Braniff, Eastern,  and others
> went into bankruptcy.
>
> Here in Florida, Breeze Airways provides services
> between second tier airports in the US,  Avelo
> Airways provides services out of Lakeland for as
> low as $39.  Breeze was founded by David Neeleman
> and various investors. He was a founder of JetBlue
> and Gol.

The interesting thing about Frontier and Spirit is that they serve larger airports instead of secodary airports as you pointed out. Frontier may expand quicker than they already are by picking up Spirit gates and slots.On the other hand, I would bet United is waiting to get their hands on those spirit A321Neos. Maybe even add A320Neos to the fleet. I personally believe that the LCC space is not the way of the future anymore, or at least think that premium is taking off. I am a United 1K. Whenever I fly Polaris, its full. Demostic first class is full. Heck, the whole plane is typically full. Guess we will see how tings play out for the rest of the year.

And...JetBlue wanted to buy Spirit so that it could have an ultra-low-fare carrier under its wing and undercut its existing model? Right. Had that gone through there'd be one less low-fare option, same as today.

Maybe Spirit's investors should have supported the Frontier merger offer, which had a chance to be a successful marriage and may have passed regulatory muster due to its intent of creating a bigger, stronger low-fare carrier.

If Jet Blue took over Spirit, they would have had layoffs and service cuts at the combined airline, and/or it would have seriously damaged Jet Blue. 

Where are all the yellow planes going ? To a desert in Arizona ? 



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/26 07:39 by joemvcnj.

Low cost carriers all bear the same economic problems: they appeal to a class of flyer that has proven impossible to make profitable regardless of how the product is configured.  That's one issue.  The larger is simply the economics of operating an airline. All the LCC's began with iffy degrees of capitalization.  They leased new with zero-time engines, landing gear and other high-cost time/cycle driven components.  But as soon as the time came for major maintenance intervals smacked them in the face their cost per available seat mile began to creep up.  That's another issue.  The third is they all began with their employees at the bottom of the wage scale, with no real way to address increased employee costs as the airline ages.  Pilots and technicians are worth their weight in gold...almost. Technicians are bumping up against the $100/hr wage scale because so few computer-game drunek kids want to work with their hands, or work period.  There is a quickly approaching demographic cliff where nearly 60% of the technicians are at or over retirement age.  Pilots are in the same category but worse.  So my predicition is that now that the major airlines have figured out how to provide the same services sold by the LCC's by unbundling, it's game over for Frontier and Jet Blue.  Just a matter of the day on a calendar.

Aww heck, with the death of Spirit Airlines, WNBA teams will now have to find another airline for their away games....



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/26 08:04 by Heath_Tower.

Certified airline mechanics are absolutely worth their weight in gold.  Here in south Florida, Piper Aviation offers paid training for many aviation craft programs. And offers high school co-op education. Not to anyone's surprise, these classes fill up fast.

Heath_Tower Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Aww heck, with the death of Spirit Airlines, WNBA
> teams will now have to find another airline for
> their away games....

Good one!  But Spirit fares are all that league can afford.  So now what do they do?

Chessie1963 Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> The infinite wisdom of not allowing Spirit and Jet
> Blue to combine due to "competitive concerns" has
> resulted in exactly the same number of carriers
> there would have been had the merger been
> approved.  The difference is that now there are
> fewer flights due to the shutdown of Spirit, and
> that would NOT have been the case had the merger
> moved forward. 
> Good job, Feds.
"Feds" - Do You mean Biden? His administration blocked
the proposed merger 3 years ago. Yea, Biden, a.k.a. "Feds."

Back to railroads😉

I read in the WSJ that the feds were looking at using the Defense Production Act to provide funding to Spirit. Didn’t the Penn Central try the same thing in 1970 before they declared bankruptcy?

Posted from iPhone

Some say the shutdown was unexpected.

Horsehockey.  Two bankruptcies in two years and a business plan which amounted to
"Lose money on every passenger and make it up in volume!"

Now United and Delta can see who gets to take over the
leases on Spirit's A321s to replace their 35 year old 757s.  American got a 
fleet of them from US Airways and ordered more, newer versions.  Their 757s 
are retired to the desert and largely going to freighter conversions.

It was Elizabeth Warren who got Biden to follow along and nix JetBlue/Spirit.

Spirit Airlines Business Plan v.2:  Get a Federal bailout and pay it back with interest.
Early, like Chrysler did.  Yeh, like that was ever going to happen.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 05/02/26 10:07 by GenePoon.

I flew Spirit once and the seat reminded me of a lawn chair and the inflight entertainment was a Sudoku puzzle printed on the back of the boarding pass.

Sounds like the sky high jet fuel prices in this economy did them in.

Steve Gass
Linden, VA
B-LineRailfan

B-LineRailfan Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> I flew Spirit once and the seat reminded me of a
> lawn chair and the inflight entertainment was a
> Sudoku puzzle printed on the back of the boarding
> pass.
>
> Sounds like the sky high jet fuel prices in this
> economy did them in.

All well as grounded planes due to Pratt and Whitney geared turbofan engine issues.