Last week, Spirit Airlines made public its plan to temporarily lay off around 1,800 flight attendants by the year’s end, with several furloughs already disclosed.
Spirit Airlines’ Senior Vice President of Guest Experience and Crew Operations, Nick Bartolotta, notified government officials via a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) that as of December 1, 2025, or within a 14-day period following that date, approximately 393 Association of Flight Attendants members will be furloughed at Las Vegas’s Harry Reid International Airport.
The furlough is intended to be temporary, though the exact duration remains uncertain, as detailed in the WARN notice. The WARN Act mandates that companies furnish a written notice 60 days prior to large-scale layoffs or plant closures.
A comparable WARN notice has been issued in Illinois, alerting that over 60 Spirit employees stationed at O’Hare International Airport will face furloughs in December. In Georgia, a WARN notice indicates that over 330 employees at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport will be temporarily laid off.
In Florida, Spirit forecasted that nearly 800 employees will be affected. This includes “70 employees belonging to the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers” and centers around more than 300 flight attendants at Fort Lauderdale International Airport, 350 at Orlando International Airport, and 71 at Miami International Airport.
The notices also stated, “Further, this furlough is subject to the terms of the applicable Collective Bargaining Agreement (‘CBA’). Bumping rights (the ability to avoid furlough by replacing another employee), if any, for unionized workers will abide by the relevant CBA between the Company and the Union.”
The Association of Flight Attendants said last month that it was working to secure “preferential interviews” with other airlines for furloughed flight attendants.
In a letter to its members, the union said that while it initially succeeded in staving off furloughs as Spirit tries to slash costs, “the problem is that the significant reduction of aircraft and flight hours requires a much higher reduction in force.”
In early September, Spirit Airlines announced that it was discontinuing service to 11 cities to focus on its strongest-performing markets. Eight of the 11 cities had services to and from Las Vegas. Services to those cities are set to stop the week of Oct. 2, according to a statement released by Spirit Airlines.
This came on the heels of the budget carrier filing for bankruptcy protection, just months after emerging from its first Chapter 11 reorganization. Spirit CEO and President Dave Davis said the company is focused on reducing debt and raising capital.
The airline also instituted furloughs and job cuts before filing for bankruptcy last year.
The company’s cost-cutting efforts continued after it emerged from bankruptcy protection in March, including plans to furlough about 270 pilots and downgrade some 140 captains to first officers in the coming months.
Those changes, which are set to take effect on Oct. 1 and Nov. 1, were also tied to expected flight demand in 2026, the company has said.
Spirit has said it was considering selling off certain aircraft and real estate. Its fleet is relatively young, making the airline an attractive target. But buyout attempts from budget rivals like JetBlue and Frontier were unsuccessful both before and during Spirit’s first bankruptcy process.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
