Flight attendants at the embattled ultra-low-cost carrier Spirit have warned of potentially big changes coming to the airline’s flight schedules in the coming months as a prepackaged Chapter 11 bankruptcy process continues apace.
In an internal memo, the Association of Flight Attendants (AFA-CWA) notified crew members at the Florida-based airline that “many adjustments” were to be made to their flying schedules and that the changes were going to be bigger than they had seen in the “past years.”
“In the past, we had significant schedule changes in the fall and the spring. We are now looking at these types of schedule changes on a monthly basis,” the memo continued. “The company is continually looking at the destinations that will benefit them financially and get us all back on track.”
While the flight attendant union says it understands that its members will be frustrated with the inconsistent flying and changes to how they’ve previously worked, the union also cautioned that they are in a “precarious situation.”
The next big schedule change is set to come into effect on February 10, with crew members seeing a much bigger emphasis on weekend flying as Spirit tries to target as much leisure traffic as possible.
On November 18, 2024, Spirit chief executive Ted Christie announced the airline would be entering Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection under a prepackaged process, or restructuring support agreement, which was supported by a supermajority of its loyalty and convertible bondholders.
Because of the prepackaged nature of the process, Christie is hopeful that Spirit can emerge from Chapter 11 protection by the end of March.
News that Spirit had sought bankruptcy protection came just days after talks with Frontier Airlines over a potential merger collapsed for the second time. Christie has promised that flight schedules will continue as normal throughout the process.
Spirit’s financial mess can be traced back to February 2022, when the airline announced its intention to merge with Frontier Airlines in a deal that would have created the fifth-largest airline in the United States.
That deal was, however, abandoned when JetBlue wooed Spirit’s shareholders with a much higher offer. Unfortunately, the partnership between JetBlue and Spirit faced stiff opposition from the Biden administration, which tasked the Justice Department with blocking the deal in court.
A federal judge agreed with the DOJ’s argument that the merger would have harmed competition, claiming that the decision to block the deal was to the benefit of Spirit’s low-income customers.
Spirit’s sect of AFA is generally far more realistic than other carriers. This is the only airline that didn’t have to lay off flight attendants for Covid – AFA said “let us figure it out” and got enough voluntary leaves, shared schedules, etc., to avoid anybody going out involuntarily.
I think it’s better to approach, as they are, with the outlook that this is coming, so get ready for it, and being open to partnering in changes than pontificating that they won’t stand for this and making other comments that have no teeth. (NK AFA has in the past partnered, and gotten rewarded for it… including in a weather meltdown or two being willing to work to FARs and waive contract for 24 hours to get the ship righted).
That’s fair to the union membership to have a transparent lay of the land.
SkyWest also did not lay anyone off during covid
Spirit deserves to fade away