April 18 – Spirit Airlines will offer a new destination from Manchester-Boston Regional Airport starting Wednesday with a sold-out flight to Myrtle Beach, the first time the airport has taken a non-stop commercial flight to South Carolina, says Ted Kitchens, airport manager.
On May 5, Spirit will end its seasonal flights to Tampa and Fort Myers.
“It will continue to provide a beach destination throughout the summer as well as a very family-friendly vacation destination with plenty of outdoor activities,” Kitchens said.
Spirit will continue to offer daily flights to Orlando and Fort Lauderdale. The same number of flights will take off from the airport with daily flights to Myrtle Beach. Spirit Airlines is the largest airline at Myrtle Beach International Airport, according to South Carolina’s Post and Courier.
The new destination comes as Spirit, along with other airlines, such as JetBlue, have canceled hundreds of cross-country flights in the past two weeks. JetBlue is now trying to buy Spirit Airlines for $3.6 billion, in competition with a bid from Frontier Airlines, which announced a proposed merger with Spirit in February in a $6.6 billion deal.
Kitchens said the peak cancellation occurred during spring break and was caused by staff shortages linked to the pandemic and “unusually strong weather and persistently bad weather in Florida,” he wrote in an email to Union Leader. Two weeks ago, Spirit experienced “an unusually high number of cancellations in Manchester”.
“Since they began operations in October, Spirit’s cancellation rate is in line with the rest of the airlines serving the airport,” he wrote.
Kitchens said Spirit will fly six daily flights from April 20 to May 5. A similar schedule during the winter break was successful.
“There is definitely pent-up demand,” Kitchens said. “All of our other airlines are looking strong.”
Other airlines at Manchester Airport are American, Southwest and United airlines. Kitchens said the airport was ready to accommodate any attack by travelers.
“If everything works out the way we want it to go well, we’ll be back to the way it was before the pandemic for just a two-week period,” he said. “It’s going down after spring break because we’re still missing that business trip yet.”
Scott Milne, president of Milne Travel, an independent travel management company based in Manchester, said Spirit would likely choose Myrtle Beach because of the low-cost tourist draw.
He said the demand for travel has reached its highest levels in the past 10 years.
“He’s very busy,” Milne said.
Milne described the recent massive flight delays and cancellations over the past two weeks as unprecedented. He said travelers should be fairly compensated for the disruptions, particularly given the $40 billion in federal aid.
In terms of air travel, Europe is a popular destination at the moment as well as destinations in the United States
“We’re seeing people pop up here who haven’t traveled for two years,” Milne said. Some are concerned about inflation, but many have more discretionary money set aside for trips. Often times, trips involved multiple generations of families.
Spirit is running a “spiritual” promotion where anyone can win four round-trip tickets from Manchester to Myrtle Beach with a four-night stay at Island Vista Resort in Myrtle Beach. Guests pack their bags and hope to win tickets a few hours before the new flights. The competition takes place between 1:30 and 2 pm on Wednesdays.
The airport saw a nearly 50% increase in passengers last year compared to 2020, but it still has a long way to go to surpass 2019 numbers, and Kitchens said the airport has returned about 75% to normal.
January saw 74,982 passengers, a 170% increase from January 2021.
February saw 87,768 passengers, up 181.6% from February 2021.
“We need business travel back,” Kitchens said. “That’s what’s holding us back as a market and a region. The whole New England area is getting late for business trips back.”
