{"id":158680,"date":"2026-02-17T18:27:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-17T18:27:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/158680\/"},"modified":"2026-02-17T18:27:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-17T18:27:09","slug":"spirit-plans-to-sell-20-planes-add-atlanta-flights-recall-500-attendants-sun-sentinel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/158680\/","title":{"rendered":"Spirit plans to sell 20 planes, add Atlanta flights, recall 500 attendants \u2013 Sun Sentinel"},"content":{"rendered":"

Financially-pressed Spirit Airlines, which is reorganizing in Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is taking steps to sell 20 of its planes in a court-supervised auction while recalling 500 flight attendants and adding seasonal service out of Atlanta.<\/p>\n

Since filing a second bankruptcy petition<\/a> in less than a year last August, management at the Dania Beach-based budget carrier has been operating on multiple fronts: cutting costs, realigning its network and recalibrating service so it has a broader appeal to travelers.<\/p>\n

Seasonal Atlanta boost<\/p>\n

On Tuesday, the company announced it intends to add service at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport in April, using its 20th anniversary of serving the Georgia capital as a promotional peg.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is not to \u2018bulk up\u2019 ATL as a key hub \u2014 the flights are seasonal, based on demand,\u201d a spokesman said in an email Tuesday.<\/p>\n

In an offer with a two-day window, the airline is shaving 20% off base fares, but flights must be booked Wednesday and Thursday for travel March 15 through May 20, \u201cexcluding blackout dates.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSpirit has delivered unmatched value to ATL travelers since 2006, and we continue to play an important role in driving competition at the world\u2019s busiest airport,\u201d Andrea Lusso, Spirit\u2019s vice president of network planning, said in a prepared statement. \u201cWe\u2019re dedicated to serving the Atlanta community with reliable service and exceptional value, and we thank the ATL airport team for their support over the years.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spirit said it intends to offer 18 peak-day departures from Atlanta starting in April, \u201cwith nonstop service to destinations across the U.S. and Caribbean,\u201d the company said in the statement.<\/p>\n

In Florida, Spirit intends to operate five daily flights to Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport, where Spirit was still No. 1<\/a> in market share as of the end of 2025.<\/p>\n

At Miami International Airport, Spirit will operate a daily flight, and will increase service to Orlando International Airport to three times daily starting April 15.<\/p>\n

Elsewhere, the airline is boosting service to the following destinations from Atlanta:<\/p>\n

Chicago\u2019s O\u2019Hare International: Resuming nonstop daily service, with a frequency increase to twice daily.
\nDallas-Fort Worth: Daily.
\nDetroit: Twice daily.
\nHouston (Intercontinental): 11 times weekly.
\nNewark, N.J.: Twice daily.
\nPhiladelphia: Resuming daily service.
\nSan Juan, Puerto Rico: Daily.<\/p>\n

Atlanta-based Delta Air Lines, which for years has been the predominant carrier at Hartsfield, did not immediately respond to questions regarding how it intends to respond to the Spirit move.<\/p>\n

\"AA Spirit Airlines jetliner takes off as others are parked at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport. The airline is planning to sell 20 planes through a federal bankruptcy court auction in April. (Amy Beth Bennett \/ South Florida Sun Sentinel)
\nPlanes for sale<\/p>\n

In U.S. Bankruptcy Court in the Southern District of New York, Spirit filed a motion for approval of an auction of 20 Airbus 320 and 321 jetliners that would take place in April.<\/p>\n

From the start of the August bankruptcy filing, Spirit has vowed to run a smaller airline, which has meant dramatically reducing its pre-Chapter 11 fleet of more than 200 Airbus jetliners. Management has steadily renegotiated or canceled leases on planes it decided it no longer needs, and arranged the sale of others.<\/p>\n

CSDS Asset Management of Arizona has agreed to serve as a \u201cstalking horse bidder\u201d for all\u00a0 20 planes at a starting price of $533.5 million, according to the court filing. If the court approves, Spirit will seek competing offers starting at $554 million.<\/p>\n

The sale is \u201can essential step\u201d in the airline\u2019s restructuring effort, the filing says, and will relieve the company of a variety of cost burdens including labor, maintenance, flying and storage.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs part of our ongoing restructuring, we have reached an agreement to sell 20 aircraft that have been held for sale for some time,\u201d the spokesman said Tuesday. \u201cMost of these aircraft are not currently in revenue service. If approved by the court, this transaction will give us greater financial flexibility. The aircraft involved will be phased out of our fleet starting in April 2026. We do not anticipate any changes to our near-term schedule or staffing as a result of this transaction.\u201d<\/p>\n

Once the sale is completed, Spirit will be operating 94 planes, with 28 owned and 66 leased, according to the court file. It currently has 114 planes in the fleet.<\/p>\n

Hundreds of attendants recalled<\/p>\n

The airline, meanwhile, is reactivating 500 of 1,300 unionized flight attendants<\/a> who were furloughed late last year, the company confirmed.<\/p>\n

\u201cAs we continue to make adjustments to meet the evolving needs of our business, we are issuing recall notices to 500 Flight Attendants who were involuntarily furloughed on Dec. 1, 2025,\u201d the company spokesman said. \u201cRecalled Flight Attendants were sent a notice on Feb. 12, 2026, and those who accept will return to duty in the timeframe detailed in the Collective Bargaining Agreement.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Association of Flight Attendants-CWA called the move \u201cwelcome news.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve been pushing hard to get our flying partners back to the line and management just announced the recall of 500 flight attendants back to the line to help the operation,\u201d the union said in a Feb. 11 post on its website.<\/p>\n

The union said the recalls will occur \u201cin order of system seniority, involuntarily furloughed first.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is good news for 500 Flight Attendants and their families and critical to those of us on the line that have faced a grueling operation over the last two months,\u201d the message said. \u201cThe company\u2019s goal in recalling Flight Attendants is to ease some of the operational issues since the furloughs.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Financially-pressed Spirit Airlines, which is reorganizing in Chapter 11 bankruptcy, is taking steps to sell 20 of its…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":158681,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[506,558,8904,28,29,249,251,250,114,123,373,5741,115,557,109,1798,4556],"class_list":{"0":"post-158680","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-fort-lauderdale","8":"tag-broward-county","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-dania-beach","11":"tag-florida","12":"tag-florida-news","13":"tag-fort-lauderdale","14":"tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","15":"tag-fort-lauderdale-news","16":"tag-latest-headlines","17":"tag-miami","18":"tag-miami-dade-county","19":"tag-national-news","20":"tag-news","21":"tag-palm-beach-county","22":"tag-social","23":"tag-transportation","24":"tag-west-palm-beach"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158681"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158680"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}