Spirit Airlines is no more.
On Saturday, May 2, the low-cost carrier officially sunsetted service after 33 years under the Spirit banner after several consecutive years of financial turmoil, two bankruptcy filings, and one failed government bailout.
The final Spirit Airlines flight took place early Saturday morning between Detroit, Michigan, and Dallas-Fort Worth, Texas.
The company called its shutdown an “orderly wind-down” that was the result of failure to create “a sustainable path forward,” despite efforts to keep the business afloat and improve the state of its financials.
“Unfortunately, despite the Company’s efforts, the recent material increase in oil prices and other pressures on the business have significantly impacted Spirit’s financial outlook,” Spirit Airlines wrote in a news release Saturday. “With no additional funding available to the Company, Spirit had no choice but to begin this wind-down.”
The “wind-down,” in earnest a complete stoppage of service, involving the immediate cancellation of flight and an urgent message to passengers to not travel to the airport for their previously scheduled flights.
According to travel deal-tracking website Going, Spirit was scheduled to operate more than 600 flights this weekend, leaving as many as 100,000 people scrambling to find accommodations.
As expected, several airlines, including American Airlines, Frontier Airlines and United Airlines, did swoop in to offer emergency “rescue fares,” but those fares were expected to be run out quick, as well as be markedly higher than the original booking via Spirit.
Earlier this week, industry experts raised alarms about existing flight reservations and what might happen to those who booked a doomed Spirit Airlines flight in the future, warning that refunds would be “highly unlikely” for most travelers.
But on Saturday, Spirit’s final word to consumers soothed most of those concerns.
The airline assured inconvenienced customers that flights purchased through Spirit with credit or debit cards will be reimbursed to the original form of payment. But customers who used other payment methods like flight credits, vouchers or rewards points, will have to wait for the bankruptcy process to be completed before knowing if they’ll receive anything.
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Customers who used travel agents for their bookings will need to contact their travel agent directly to request a refund, Spirit added.
Spirit customers who purchased travel insurance are also encouraged to check the terms of their agreement to see if there are other refund options available.
Spirit will be providing updates on its “wind-down” process on a dedicated website where travelers can track the status of these potential refunds.
Spirit Airlines leadership says goodbye
Spirit’s CEO Dave Davis said there appeared to be a solution to the airline’s money troubles back in March when the company agreed on a restructuring plan with its bondholders. But the sudden and soaring costs of fuel spurred by the U.S.’s war with Iran made those precarious plans fall through and left the company with no alternative to continue operations without a major cash infusion.
“Sustaining the business required hundreds of millions of additional dollars of liquidity that Spirit simply does not have and could not procure. This is tremendously disappointing and not the outcome any of us wanted,” Davis said.
Leading up to Spirit’s final moments, the company was in talks with the Trump Administration on a potential emergency bailout that would’ve given the airline the cash it needed in exchange for a significant ownership stake in the company. But that federal bailout failed to materialize as Spirit reached the point of no return.
Stil, Davis thanked the White House and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick for entertaining the idea, and working to save the thousands of jobs that are now gone.
Davis also thanked the airline’s stakeholders, labor unions and other business partners who stuck around to try and weather the repeated storms of financial insecurity, as well as the company’s employees who he says worked tirelessly to provide a “safe, affordable and award-winning option to the traveling public.”
“For more than 30 years, Spirit Airlines has played a pioneering role in making travel more accessible and bringing people together while driving affordability across the industry,” Davis added.
In the coming months, the impact of Spirit’s departure will become clear. But travel experts, industry officials and observers almost unanimously presume that ticket prices across the industry will go up without Spirit providing the much-needed cheaper alternative to keep larger airlines honest.
