Allegiant Air LLC said its November passenger count jumped nearly 20 percent, the number of departures increased 18.7 percent, and its load factor increased by 0.6 points. Officials at Allegiant also announced Monday the company has signed an agreement to buy 18 MD-80 aircraft from Scandinavian Airlines Systems.
Allegiant Air LLC said its November passenger count jumped nearly 20 percent, the number of departures increased 18.7 percent, and its load factor increased by 0.6 points. Officials at Allegiant also announced Monday the company has signed an agreement to buy 18 MD-80 aircraft from Scandanavian Airline Systems.
The company also said in a release that Allegiant Air will take delivery of the new aircraft during the first three quarters of 2010 and will put them in service by the end of 2011.
The low-fare leisure airline reported that it carried 374,476 passengers last month, up from 313,245 passengers in November 2008. The number of departures increased from 2,364 for November 2008 to 2,805 this year. The carrier reported a load factor of 90.4 percent last month, compared to a load factor of 89.8 percent the year before.
Allegiant also announced plans this week that it is establishing a new base at Orlando International Airport in February 2010, serving 10 U.S. cities.
Allegiant Air operates four weekly flights to Las Vegas and two weekly flights to Los Angeles and Phoenix-Mesa from Wichita Mid-county Airport.
The company currently operates 46 MD-80s and expects the cost of placing the 18 new aircraft into service to be less than $4 million per plane.
"Our ability to acquire such highly-reliable aircraft at attractive economics permits Allegiant to closely tailor our capacity to demand, a key element of our leisure-oriented business model,” Allegiant President and CFO Andrew Levy said in a press release. “This is the fifth aircraft transaction Allegiant has entered with SAS, which has, at all times, been a stellar business partner to Allegiant Travel Company.”
