Spirit Airways retains off on resuming flights from Arnold Palmer airport to Ft. Myers

About an hour ago

Travellers flying from Arnold Palmer Regional Airport may possibly be restricted to Orlando as a location for the immediate upcoming, portion of the continuing hit air journey is having from the covid-19 pandemic.

Whilst Spirit Airlines flights from the Unity airport to Myrtle Beach, S.C., are envisioned to resume Feb. 12, Westmoreland County Airport Authority members are concerned about the scarcity of flights from Arnold Palmer to Ft. Myers, one more Florida location that has been readily available in the past.

As of Tuesday early morning, in accordance to the Spirit Airways web page, no flights from Unity to Ft. Myers are obtainable until finally March 10 — immediately after which they are scheduled about every other working day.

The previous these kinds of flight was on Jan. 4, according to authority Executive Director Gabe Monzo, and he pointed out passenger numbers had been minimal. “We were sending planes with 32 persons on them,” he said.

In distinction, he reported, 133 passengers are booked for a Thursday flight to Orlando. For now, Orlando flights are made available 4 times for each week, with a daily timetable slated to resume in early February, according to the Spirit internet site.

“The bookings have dropped off with the past covid scare immediately after Xmas,” Monzo claimed of Spirit flights, which are the only commercial routes offered at the airport. He advised several persons haven’t booked flights extra than a week in advance simply because of uncertainty about how altering pandemic situations and limits could possibly have an affect on their journey programs.

According to the Spirit web-site, the airline is presenting flights to Ft. Myers from Pittsburgh Global Airport 4 days per week.

Authority member Janice Smarto questioned whether a portion of the travellers booked on people flights would have in its place departed from Arnold Palmer, if a flight had been accessible. She mentioned a spouse and children member had reserved a trip to Ft. Myers from Unity, but the flight was canceled.

Monzo mentioned he would relay the problems to Spirit officials. He speculated that the airline may perhaps be basing its flight plan on previous bookings, ensuing in a lag of a number of weeks.

A Spirit Airlines spokesman did not promptly reply to a request for remark.

A 12 months-end report confirmed a intense downturn in air traffic at Arnold Palmer in 2020, one thing that was noticed sector huge. The number of outgoing travellers at the Unity airport plummeted from 155,905 in 2019 to 62,670 in the past 12 months. Total travellers, together with arrivals, fell from 309,817 to 123,511.

Pandemic delays route from Pittsburgh

Another lower-fare provider, Allegiant Air, introduced Tuesday it plans to add nonstop flights from Pittsburgh Intercontinental to Norfolk, Va., starting June 3. It’s a single of 8 routes serving various metropolitan areas the airline experienced planned to insert very last calendar year, in advance of they ended up postponed by the pandemic.

Jeff Himler is a Tribune-Critique staff writer. You can make contact with Jeff at 724-836-6622, [email protected] or by using Twitter .