Does Spirit’s collapse signal the end of cheap flights? | The Excerpt

On the Tuesday, May 12, 2026, episode of The Excerpt podcast: Summer travel season is approaching amid major changes in the airline industry. Spirit Airlines’ collapse, rising fuel costs and disrupted routes could mean fewer choices. USA TODAY Consumer Travel Reporter Zach Wichter joins The Excerpt to discuss what these shifts mean for summer travelers.

Hit play on the player below to hear the podcast and follow along with the transcript beneath it. This transcript was automatically generated, and then edited for clarity in its current form. There may be some differences between the audio and the text.

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Dana Taylor:

Summer travel season is getting underway, but this year travelers are facing a perfect storm of new pressures in the airline industry. The budget airline Spirit Airlines has collapsed after years of financial struggles eliminating one of the country's biggest low cost carriers just as millions of Americans prepare to fly for their summer vacation. The same time the war on Iran is driving up fuel costs and disrupting global aviation routes, raising concerns about higher ticket prices and fewer options for travelers.

Questions remain about what flying will look like in the months ahead and whether the era of cheap, easy air travel is starting to disappear. Hello and welcome to USA TODAY's The Excerpt. I'm Dana Taylor. Today is Tuesday, May 12th, 2026. For more on what all of this means for your summer travel plans, I'm joined by USA TODAY's consumer travel reporter, Zach Wichter. Zach, it's great to speak with you again.

Zach Wichter:

Great to be here. Thanks for having me back.

Dana Taylor:

Zach, Spirit Airlines was known for ultra cheap fares and a travel experience people either loved or they loved to complain about. But beyond the memes and reputation, how significant is it that a major budget carrier has collapsed right before the summer travel season?

Zach Wichter:

It is hugely significant. Spirit Airlines had a really almost outsized impact on the aviation market in the US. As an ultra low cost competitor to the other major airlines, they forced these other airlines to drive their prices down in any market where they were competing with Spirit.

And so as we head into the summer now that Spirit has exited the market, we're really expecting to see higher airfares kind of across the board, both because of the higher oil prices with the war in Iran that you mentioned, but also because this major factor, this major competitor that's driving down prices in the market is no longer there.

Dana Taylor:

In fact, it's not just oil prices. Airlines are also rerouting flights and dealing with instability in the Middle East. How much is that adding pressure to the entire airline industry right now?

Zach Wichter:

So it is adding pressure to the airline industry, but that pressure isn't totally even across the industry. So obviously the war in the Middle East in terms of routing isn't affecting domestic flights within the US. So we're not going to see a huge impact from that on domestic summer travel. But for American travelers who may be heading farther afield this summer, maybe they're going to Asia or Africa, the Middle East was a really major transfer point for a lot of travelers.

There are some major global airlines with hubs there. And while most of them have gotten close to restoring their full pre-schedules as they were before the start of the conflict, they're not still 100% back to where they were. And as a result of the conflict, a lot of airlines are avoiding airspace in that region. And so as we head into the summer, depending on how the conflict, if it ramps back up or what the shape of it is in the coming months, that could further affect the ability to transit through that airspace or to transfer through those airports.

So we really just need to see. It's hard to say from where we sit today exactly what it's going to mean for the summer or for the longer term. If I can just add, a good parallel here is the war in Russia and Ukraine. And a result of that has been that US airlines and many Western airlines can no longer fly Russian airspace, which is leading to longer, less efficient routing from the US to Asia in particular. And so a similar effect could take place over the Middle East if the war is sort of a protracted war.

Dana Taylor:

Spirit clearly had problems before the Iran conflict. There were failed mergers, debt, bankruptcy filings. So was the war really the cause of the collapse or more the final straw?

Zach Wichter:

I would say that the war and the run-up in oil prices was more the final straw than the only reason for the collapse. As you said, Spirit has been in dire financial straits for quite some time and they had two consecutive bankruptcies in the last two years and part of their plan to emerge from that most recent bankruptcy hinged on oil prices being in the low to mid $2 a gallon range for jet fuel.

And so when oil prices spiked to the mid $4 range a gallon for jet fuel, it really blew a hole in Spirit's recovery plans. Another kind of headwind that Spirit has been facing is since the COVID pandemic, the demand for travel has not recovered evenly and we've seen a much greater surge in demand for premium leisure travel. So as an ultra low cost carrier, Spirit was sort of designed to serve a market that wasn't performing as strongly as it was pre-pandemic.

Dana Taylor:

We've already seen other airlines roll out so called rescue fares for those stranded Spirit passengers, but long-term, do experts think those lower fares will stick around once the immediate fallout settles?

Zach Wichter:

No. So those rescue fares are really temporary measures. They were only available for a matter of days and in some cases weeks, but really only a matter of days to help passengers who were stranded by Spirit Airlines going out of business get back home or get to where they needed to go. Longer term, the trend definitely points towards higher airfares across the board because of oil prices and again, because of the exit of this ultra low cost competitor that was forcing other carriers to compete more directly on price.

Dana Taylor:

As you mentioned, it seems like the airline industry has spent years pushing travelers toward more premium experiences, upgraded seats, lounges, extra perks. Are airlines basically telling consumers, Zach, that the era of ultra cheap flying just isn't profitable anymore?

Zach Wichter:

I think it's actually kind of the opposite. I think it's consumers telling airlines that that's not what they want. It takes a lot of money and a lot of time for airlines to invest in these premium products. You can't just decide to build a new airport lounge or to retrofit your planes with more premium seating. So airlines have been watching these trends for a number of years and seeing where the consumer demand lies and are trying to answer that demand.

My question as a reporter and something that I've been watching in my reporting is, is this demand really durable? If the economy continues to be on shaky ground, is the premium demand eventually going to dry up? Airlines don't seem to think so. They're charging full steam ahead with this emphasis on premium travel. And again, it was one of the major headwinds that Spirit was facing that was a contributor to its tough financial position even before the oil prices spiked.

So it remains to be seen kind of how long this trend holds, but it's more that the airlines are answering the market, not that the airlines are themselves killing the market for ultra cheap travel.

Dana Taylor:

That's interesting. So TSA is also getting additional funding and staffing support heading into the summer after horror stories about long lines and understaffed airports. Could travelers actually notice a difference this year?

Zach Wichter:

So I would say they will notice a difference compared to if they were flying during spring break, which was a really kind of outlier in terms of TSA lines. I expect this summer will look similar to other summers, and so it depends what your benchmark is for what you're measuring the difference against. I don't think we're going to see a huge improvement over last summer in TSA lines.

The Transportation Security Administration lost approximately a thousand employees during the most recent partial government shutdown. And my understanding is they've had some trouble attracting new candidates because of the uncertainty surrounding their funding, even though funding is now flowing and we're not anticipating a further funding lapse this summer. So I don't think it's going to be significantly different than other summers, but it will be better than it was in the spring.

Dana Taylor:

What's the bigger pressure point for travelers this summer, higher ticket prices, fewer flight options, or congestion and delays at airports?

Zach Wichter:

I think of those three, fewer flight options is probably the least of the worries because with Spirit out of the market, airlines are going to try to redeploy capacity and capture some of those passengers who may have been booked to fly on Spirit. During the summer, airfares are typically higher than other times of year because it's a time that a lot of people want to travel and congestion is also a problem because strong storms during the summer can lead to significant flight delays.

This summer, the run-up in airfares is probably a little more significant than in other years because of what's going on in the Middle East and the price of oil. So that may be kind of the most acute pain point for travelers, but the summer storms are still going to be coming. And I anticipate in the next couple months, I'm sure I'll be writing about an aviation system meltdown at some point where a strong storm swept through a major hub of some airline and it took them a day or two to recover from the fallout of that. It happens every year and I don't think it's going to be any different this year.

Dana Taylor:

I was going to ask, are there particular routes or regions where people are most likely to see fare increases now that Spirit is gone? Florida, where I am, is a major hub for the airline. It feels like an obvious example, but are there others?

Zach Wichter:

Yeah. So what's been really interesting in the reporting on this is all of the analysts and industry watchers who I talk to are essentially in agreement that the exit of Spirit does mean that we're going to see higher airfares more or less across the board, but a lot of them are also pointing out that airlines really need to play a balancing act here. If they raise fares too much too quickly, they could cannibalize some of their demand and drive people away from air travel.

So it remains to be seen how much and how quickly the airfares actually rise by. The thing about the Florida market, and it's true, Spirit had a big presence there, but it's also a well-served market by a lot of other airlines. I think where you're more likely to see a more significant increase in airfare is in markets where Spirit was either the only airline and a new different player comes in or in a market where Spirit was only competing with one other airline.

Another thing relatedly that I'm keeping my eye on is... Well, two things really. One is, does this exit give a chance for other smaller low cost competitors to grow? That remains to be seen. I feel like some airlines may be really well positioned to capture some of this demand and strategically grow their operation. The other thing that we've seen, and it's sort of related to the premium travel piece that we were talking about, airlines as a way to compete with Spirit Airlines introduce this basic economy fare that's now so ubiquitous.

It was not something that network carriers like American, United, and Delta sold before they had to really start competing with Spirit on price. But as we've seen this rise in premium travel, even airlines selling those basic tickets have said that generally they see a pretty good margin of upsell where passengers who may be looking at basic economy tickets ultimately decide to purchase a more expensive ticket bundle.

And what I'm sort of curious about, and this isn't something we're going to know for a number of months or maybe a year or more, is as Spirit's former customers redistribute them through the system, are airlines selling more basic economy tickets or do Spirit's former customers follow the trend when they go to another airline and purchase up to a higher ticket tier?

Dana Taylor:

Zach, when we look back on this summer travel season a few months from now, what do you think will be the defining story?

Zach Wichter:

Oh man, who knows? I wish I had an easy answer. I wish I had a crystal ball. We're just getting started with the summer travel season. It's not even Memorial Day yet. If the war in Iran ramps up again, that could be the defining feature. If there's a major storm, that could be the defining feature. Yeah, I don't know. It's hard to say. And that's how it is with the airline industry all the time. There are so many variables.

Certainly the major story of the month of May is going to be Spirit Airlines going out of business, but who knows what's going to happen once we get past Memorial Day and into June. Part of what I love about covering the airline industry is every day is different and something unexpected always seems to be happening. That said, I hope it's a really calm summer and that I have basically nothing to report on because we all want a summer vacation.

Dana Taylor:

Zach Wichter is a consumer travel reporter for USA TODAY. It's always good to have you on, Zach. Thank you.

Zach Wichter:

My pleasure. Thanks for having me.

Dana Taylor:

Thanks for listening. I'm Dana Taylor. Subscribe and make The Excerpt part of your weekday routine. New episodes are available every morning.