{"id":255213,"date":"2026-05-02T10:03:08","date_gmt":"2026-05-02T10:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/255213\/"},"modified":"2026-05-02T10:03:08","modified_gmt":"2026-05-02T10:03:08","slug":"spirit-airlines-says-its-going-out-of-business-ending-operations-immediately","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/255213\/","title":{"rendered":"Spirit Airlines says it\u2019s going out of business ending operations immediately"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spirit Airlines, the infamous yellow budget airline that competed against major carriers for over three decades, turned off its engines<\/a> for the final time early Saturday morning.<\/p>\n

Company officials announced that the airline, which employed more than 17,000 people, has gone out of business and ceased operations \u201ceffective immediately\u201d after it was unable to secure enough funding from the federal government.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cIt is with great disappointment that on May 2, 2026, Spirit Airlines started an orderly wind-down of our operations, effective immediately,\u201d the company wrote in a statement to its website.<\/p>\n

\u201cTo 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,\u201d the now defunct airline added.<\/p>\n

Spirit Airlines, an impish upstart that shook the industry with its irreverent ads and deep discount fares, announced Saturday that it has gone out of business after 34 years. REUTERS<\/p>\n

Spirit\u2019s website was revamped to correspond with the announcement, showing no flight information, changing its link to SpiritStructuring.com<\/a>, and advising ticketed passengers to stay home.<\/p>\n

\u201cSpirit Guests should not go to the airport,\u201d a warning reads.<\/p>\n

Approximately 277 Spirit flights scheduled for Saturday had been cancelled, with a majority out of Southeast, according to FlightAware.<\/a><\/p>\n

Spirit Airlines Flight 1833, one of the last flights for the company before operations were shut down, had traveled from Detroit, Mich., before landing at Dallas-Fort Worth International Airport at 12:17 a.m.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a pleasure working with you guys, and I wish you the best,\u201d a DFW official told the pilots of the flight, according to audio shared on Reddit.<\/a><\/p>\n

Spirit airplanes sit parked at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport on April 23, 2026. REUTERS<\/p>\n

A message from Spirit Airlines is posted for customers at Orlando International Airport on May 2, 2026. REUTERS<\/p>\n

Spirit first began operations as a Michigan-based trucking company before turning to the sky and taking flight in the 1980s. The company had become synonymous with its bright yellow planes and very cheap seating.<\/p>\n

Spirit was hanging onto hope that the Trump administration<\/a> would bail out the company with a $500 million deal, but the embattled low-cost airline couldn\u2019t get enough backing.<\/p>\n

The troubled company had a rough time turning a profit since it was hit hard by the dramatic decrease in travel from Covid restrictions in 2020.<\/p>\n

A departure board displays cancelled Spirit Airlines flights on May 2, 2026. REUTERS<\/p>\n

Approximately 277 Spirit flights scheduled for Saturday had been cancelled, with a majority out of Southeast. ZUMAPRESS.com<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump speaks to reporters about Spirit Airlines outside the White House on May 1, 2026. ZUMAPRESS.com<\/p>\n

Travelers were also less likely to fly with Spirit, as the airline had flown about 1.7 million passengers in February, down half a million from February 2025.<\/p>\n

Seating capacity had also been reduced to half as many seats as it had back in May 2024, the Associated Press reported.<\/p>\n

Spirit had filed for bankruptcy twice in less than a year and the rising fuel costs associated with the ongoing Iran war were most likely the final nail in the coffin.<\/p>\n

The abrupt closure of operations will leave tens of thousands of workers jobless and scrambling for employment.<\/p>\n

The airline had employed approximately 17,000 personnel by the end of 2025, NBC News reported.<\/a><\/p>\n

As the potential for a shutdown loomed over the airline industry earlier Friday night, passengers began to worry about the future of air travel.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that if without spirit or without like cheaper airlines, the price of other airlines is going to shoot up, and I think that\u2019ll be a big problem, especially for me, because I fly a lot,\u201d Detroit Metro Airport traveler Lucas Trivedi told CBS News Detroit.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, I\u2019d probably have to pick the next cheapest way. I don\u2019t even know what I\u2019m going to do, probably look at Expedia and find the cheapest option,\u201d student Mariel Vargas-vonBreymann said.<\/p>\n

The abrupt closure of operations will leave tens of thousands of workers jobless and scrambling for employment. REUTERS<\/p>\n

A Spirit staff member talks to a customer at a ticket counter at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport on Nov. 18, 2024. ERIK S LESSER\/EPA-EFE \/ Shutterstock<\/p>\n

Passengers wait in line at a Spirit Arlines counter in LAX. NBCLA\/YouTube<\/p>\n

Passengers at LAX became frustrated hours before the 2 a.m. announcement as their flights began to be cancelled.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no workers here, so everybody\u2019s just lost,\u201d one traveler told NBCLA, in front of an empty ticket counter.<\/p>\n

\u201cNobody\u2019s there, and I\u2019m kinda confused. I\u2019m not gonna talk to an AI to figure out what I needed to do,\u201d Rayeed Abubaker told the outlet.<\/p>\n

Passengers who had tickets for the now-cancelled flights will receive automatic refund payments back into their accounts, the airline said Saturday.<\/p>\n

Those who used a travel agent were told to go through their liaison, while others who had used another method of booking, including vouchers or Free Spirit points will have to wait as repayment will be determined in bankruptcy court, the company said.<\/p>\n

Southwest Airlines has stepped forward to assist travelers who were impacted by Spirit\u2019s cessation of operations, offering special access fares.<\/p>\n

It was not immediately known what will happen to the company\u2019s properties, including its jets, following Saturday\u2019s shutdown<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Spirit Airlines, the infamous yellow budget airline that competed against major carriers for over three decades, turned off…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":255214,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[20371,558,24165,249,251,250,19324],"class_list":["post-255213","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fort-lauderdale","tag-airlines","tag-business","tag-companies","tag-fort-lauderdale","tag-fort-lauderdale-headlines","tag-fort-lauderdale-news","tag-spirit-airlines"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255213","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=255213"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255213\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255213"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255213"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255213"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}