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- [00:03]
A
I'm John Ostrower, editor in chief of the Air Current.
- [00:05]
B
I'm Brian Sommers and I write the Airline Observer.
- [00:07]
C
And I'm Brett Snyder, author of Cranky Flyer. You're listening to the Air show, the podcast where we talk about what goes on in the business of the sky. Today we are going to talk about something I don't usually like to talk about.
- [00:19]
B
Brett, I don't want to talk about flying coach.
- [00:21]
C
No, no, no. That's something you prefer not to talk about. I'm fine with it. Today we're going to talk about Florida.
- [00:27]
A
Florida, America's most comically shaped state.
- [00:30]
B
Brett, I'm just going to remind you. Florida. We said we weren't going to talk politics, remember?
- [00:36]
C
Yes, I know, and we aren't. Specifically, I want to talk about Fort Lauderdale, the most interesting airport in the United States today.
- [00:44]
B
Brett, didn't you recently claim that the most interesting airport after Spirit went kaput was going to be Detroit? I think you were wrong about that. But you are right today, Fort Lauderdale, way juicier, very fascinating place. Now that Spirit has gone out of
- [01:01]
C
business, Detroit is the most obvious opportunity for allegiant and sun country. I think I will give it that header. But nothing is as interesting as Fort Lauderdale. That is the case. And this goes back to before Spirit failed. We can go back to when other airlines started to realize that Spirit was probably going to fail, but that is when the vultures started circling. And by that I mean they started adding service.
- [01:24]
A
But before we get into those details, can you give a lay of the land here? Like we just need to understand the environment that we're working with here in Fort Lauderdale.
- [01:32]
C
Yeah, sure. To do that, we should talk about South Florida more broadly because Miami, also known as the city that keeps the roof blazing, matters to a lot.
- [01:42]
B
Is that true?
- [01:43]
C
That's, that's in the, in the song. The Will Smith song.
- [01:47]
B
Never heard it.
- [01:47]
C
Wow, you've never heard that song? Well, some people know and those people will smile when they hear this, so. But Miami is the primary airport in the region and it is a behemoth. Looking at cerium data for 2025, it had nearly 33 million departing seats compared to Fort Lauderdale's 20 million. And of those 33 million, more than 20 million were on American and its joint venture partners. They say Miami is the capital of Latin America. And this hub definitely shows that. It had non stop service to an incredible 83 different airports in Latin America last year and 6,73 of those were served by American.
- [02:24]
B
Brett, I can Tell that you haven't been listening to European airline earnings calls because since the politics in the United States had a bit of a shift, the new capital of Latin America is Madrid. That is what Iberia has been saying.
- [02:40]
C
Oh, that's a fair point, actually. Let's just call it a work in progress.
- [02:44]
B
But back to Miami here. We should note that Miami is still a very important link between North America and South America and even Europe and South America. South America. But it has one big problem. Miami's airport is very, very expensive. According to Raymond James, the cost per implantment has been in the 17 to 18 range recently, which I guess is reasonable for a very large airport. But the report said that it was going to be approaching $30 by 2031. That is a big number that has already made it hard for any lower cost airline to try to make a dent in Miami with or even a higher cost one. I'm sitting here in my house in Los Angeles and I can already sense American CFO Devin May having heart palpitations in the Metroplex.
- [03:34]
A
Maybe the CPE in Miami is actually American's moat. Yeah, those are pretty steep numbers. And I honestly bet that Americans still wished that this looked a lot more like Charlotte.
- [03:43]
C
I don't know. I think American's okay having that as a moat. They get some good fares there and those high costs help to keep out the riff raff. But. And this is just the way it works with these legacies in all the big cities, right? They like these. That's a discussion for another day. Let's. Let's not even get into that right now. But even with these costs, remember, Miami was all the rage during the pandemic. Southwest started in 2020. JetBlue and Spirit started in 2021. Frontier was already in the airport, but it more than tripled seats in 2021 compared to pre pandemic.
- [04:14]
A
So what's happened now?
- [04:15]
C
It's all down. Spirit's gone, but it had already scaled 2025 back to half what it flew. Two, JetBlue is pulled out entirely. Southwest dropped from more than 1.1 million seats in 2021 to about 850,000 in 2025. Frontier is still hanging in there with more than 900,000 seats in 2025. But most of its flying is to its other bases and then a little into Latin America. It hasn't really found its footing there, despite trying a lot of different things. This is a legacy dominated airport with legacy size costs.
- [04:49]
B
Yeah, it is. Although it's important to note that there are These other options in South Florida, one of them, as we mentioned, is Fort Lauderdale. That's about 40 miles north of Miami's airport. And then you have West Palm beach, which is about an hour ish north away. Those airports are not just reliever facilities for Miami. There are also airports with their own attachment areas and a lot of wealthy people who live very close to those airports. Of the two, Fort Lauderdale is a better target for, for airlines for a bunch of reasons. One of them is just West Palm beach is pretty tiny.
- [05:26]
C
That's President Donald J. Trump International Airport to you, sir.
- [05:31]
B
I can't do it, Brett. I can't do it.
- [05:32]
C
And I think we now have to pay him a royalty for even saying that. But it doesn't matter. That place is nothing. It's just over 5 million seats. It may grow some. It has some plans, but I figure once they finish gold plating the entire place, costs will have to surge there. I kid, I kid. But seriously, it's just too far north to really matter to the broader population. And South Florida.
- [05:51]
A
Well, and then there's Fort Lauderdale, which is actually pretty good size, right?
- [05:54]
C
It is. And the airport has been constrained even as it has added gates over time. Runways aren't the main issue these days, but gates are the problem, especially international gates which are limited to Terminal 4, the G gates and the new A gates in Terminal 1. And it has seen a lot of action as the low cost alternative in the region as well as being the primary airport for. For a sizable chunk of the population in the area. By my count, there are 66 gates at the airport currently. JetBlue has, I think it's 15 across the E and F gates in Terminal 3 as well as the G gates in Terminal 4. Spirit meanwhile, had 10 gates split between the F and G gates. But Spirit had more seats. It pushed its gates harder.
- [06:38]
B
And that's really it. Right? You've got a bunch of other airlines that use it as a traditional spoke. But as far as airlines that had big operations, Southwest had something until it moved its Latin America gateway up to Orlando. So it's a lot smaller in Fort Lauderdale than it was.
- [06:54]
C
Yeah, that's right. Southwest has given up a lot of what it had there by design. It's really focused on Orlando and it likes its focus in Orlando, as we saw when it announced new flights after Spirit failed. Focused on Orlando and Las Vegas, primarily in Fort Lauderdale. Delta is the biggest legacy there. And you know, really all the airlines have a decent presence is. You said it's an important spoke. It's a big destination, so everyone needs to serve it. But it's just that for most of these airlines, a destination, it's really Spirit. Or was Spirit and JetBlue that were fighting for the local traffic alongside American in Miami?
- [07:30]
A
Okay, so we know the lay of the land. But you said that the vultures had been circling, which blue and orange? Yellow also. Blue vultures have been circling. And what have they been doing since Spirit's future became cloudy?
- [07:44]
C
Trying to keep all these colors straight.
- [07:45]
A
But the blue one that we're talking
- [07:47]
C
about, the blue one, The United blue?
- [07:50]
A
No, no, no, no, no. The. The other.
- [07:52]
C
Okay. The one in Pakistan. Air blue, was it.
- [07:54]
A
Or the Romanian one. Was there a Romanian blue one, too?
- [07:57]
C
Oh, I think there was Blue Air. Right. Blue Air. All of the ULCC showed some interest. Allegiant has had a base there for almost 20 years, so it just started growing. That base. It went from 600, 000 departing seats in 2024 to 735,000 last year. It'll be bigger. Boston, Pittsburgh, Omaha and Kansas City flights.
- [08:19]
B
Sorry, are you saying Allegiant there? Allegiant is flying Boston. Is that Logan to Fort Lauderdale? Seems out of character.
- [08:26]
C
Yes.
- [08:26]
A
For the record, I actually had to check to make sure that it actually was Logan and not like Worcester or like Nantucket or Marshfield.
- [08:35]
C
None of these sound like places to someone who's not from there. That includes me.
- [08:38]
A
A lot of them have airports. Thank you very much.
- [08:40]
C
All right, sure. Maybe It's Manchester since JetBlue is pulling out. Allegiant can call that Boston. No, it is Logan. I'm actually working on a post about allegiance. Fort Lauderdale moves on crankyflyer.com for next week, but Boston is a wild one to me. That's a huge market. Delta and JetBlue have flights all day long during peak season. It looks to me like Allegiance floating a trial balloon to see if it can play the spill carrier game in some markets, just like Spirit did. I think that's very strange. But all of these are still only two or three times weekly. So it's still going to be small in Fort Lauderdale. Even after adding all this stuff, it's just going to be slightly less small, man.
- [09:17]
A
I want to see a Venn diagram between Delta's customers and Allegiance customers. Like what is that like? That is just two very different worlds.
- [09:25]
B
You know, the Allegiant people will tell you it's not as disparate as you think, especially the second house crowd going to some of these smaller markets in the Mountain West. But we'll let them write us an email and tell us what it's like.
- [09:37]
C
I mean, if I knew more about Boston, I could suggest a community that maybe would be more allegiant focused. But I don't know enough to even bother. So.
- [09:45]
A
No, you're good. No, don't do it. You're going to hurt. You're going to hurt someone.
- [09:47]
C
I know.
- [09:47]
A
Like Kevin Costner trying to do a Boston accent in 13 days. Just don't do it.
- [09:51]
C
I'm not going to try that.
- [09:52]
A
Okay, back to, of course, you know, airplanes. What about Frontier here? They've obviously built up a lot of service here, too.
- [09:58]
C
Yeah, absolutely. Frontier first started building up in 2023 when Spirit was first in play as a merger candidate, but then it kind of backed off. So now it is stepped on the gas again. Frontier had 383,000 departing seats last year. This year it is currently showing nearly a million. Not all of that will fly since we can't trust Frontier schedules to be accurate until the wheels actually are off the Runway. But Frontier is certainly making a move here.
- [10:24]
B
All right, Brett, the publish schedules whether you believe it's going to happen or not. Where are these airplanes going?
- [10:31]
C
Yes, thank you. Cerium data that we can pull this up. But a lot of what they've done is just add service to their existing bases. That accounts for about 700,000 of those seats. But Frontier has also gone into Spirit markets like Baltimore, Charlotte, Detroit and Houston. Yes, I said Detroit, Brian, Though it hasn't gone international at all, even though it operates in the A Gates. And so it would have international capability. Maybe Frontier doesn't want to hurt what it has in Miami. Or maybe it just hasn't gotten that far yet. Hard to say.
- [11:01]
A
This still looks a lot like treating Fort Lauderdale as a big destination, right?
- [11:04]
C
I think that's right. They want all those people who flew Spirit from Detroit, but. But are they really making a big play in Fort Lauderdale itself, or are they mostly targeting opportunities on routes where there's a lot less capacity today? So it's just the opportunistic game. I guess. We'll see how things continue to unfold, but so far it looks like a pretty targeted strategy.
- [11:23]
B
I think you're right, Brett, with the targeted strategy. I followed Frontier's last earnings call pretty carefully and the airline gave a few markets that I wanted to focus in. Dallas, Fort Worth, your favorite, Detroit, Las Vegas, Orlando, also Fort Lauderdale. But CEO Jimmy Dempsey said many, many times, like so many times the word discipline, that he's not going to chase share. He's not going to go in everywhere just because Spirit was there. I don't know that we're going to see a lot of growth in Fort Lauderdale or really anywhere. Plus, let's remember that Frontier long has been more enamored with, say, Mickey Mouse than the beaches of South Florida.
- [12:01]
C
That's a good point, because no matter what happens in Fort Lauderdale, Orlando is going to be bigger for them in many months. That's Frontier's largest station, period.
- [12:09]
A
So is anyone actually making a move here? Besides the obvious JetBlue, which I assume we'll talk about eventually here.
- [12:15]
C
Oh, that's the blue one you were talking about.
- [12:16]
B
Sure, yeah.
- [12:17]
A
So, fair point. I actually probably should have been more specific.
- [12:20]
C
Yeah, you know, in hindsight, it makes sense. Now you could say breezes, I guess. Breeze dipped its toes into Fort Lauderdale with flights to Akron and Wilmington, North Carolina last year. But this year it really went nuts, adding another dozen airports. But it's doing mostly things like Scranton, Myrtle Beach. Don't forget the mighty Salisbury, Maryland. It's trying to stay in its lane and go low frequency on markets without much, if any, service. So it still has fewer than 10 daily departures there.
- [12:48]
A
And that brings us to JetBlue, which has actually been serving Fort Lauderdale since the day it started flying in 2000. We'll talk about that after the break.
- [12:59]
B
Is there anything more frustrating than having a ton of points that are scattered in all the wrong places?
- [13:06]
C
That's the worst. We've all been there. When you're just short of what you need to book an award you want, but you have plenty in other airline accounts.
- [13:13]
B
Exactly. And then we all have to do travel math and see if we can find a way to get enough into that one account so we can actually hit confirm on booking.
- [13:23]
C
That's why the ability to move points around using points, a plus grade company's exchange solution, is such a game changer. It's the bridge. It lets travelers move their points to where they need them, when they need them.
- [13:34]
B
It's a huge win for travelers when it works. But we've seen exchanges before that are treated like a check the box feature. They build the connection to a partner and then it just sits there.
- [13:46]
C
Which is wild because when a member moves points, they're telling you they're ready to engage. If the program isn't paying attention in the moment, then it's just leaving revenue on the table.
- [13:55]
B
That's why points work so well. It's an actively managed, fraud secure approach that's built to actually improve performance after the connection goes live.
- [14:05]
C
Because at the end of the day, connecting partners is one thing.
- [14:09]
B
Actually moving the needle, that's another.
- [14:11]
C
Points Exchange helps leading brands move beyond simple connectivity to drive real loyalty growth. Learn more@plusgrade.com.
- [14:23]
A
And we're back. Let's talk about JetBlue.
- [14:25]
C
Okay, let's talk about JetBlue. JetBlue is going big in Fort Lauderdale. It has decided it will win this market, and it is throwing capacity into it. And to be clear, it decided this would happen. Last year, it saw Spirit shrinking its network and sending airplanes back to lessors. So JetBlue just backfilled. In July 2025, JetBlue had 350,000 departing seats. That was right before the buildup began in the fall. This coming July, it'll have nearly 600,000. It was really in late October last year when the first round of flights started, and it had only announced those in early September, right after Spirit filed for its second round of bankruptcy.
- [15:05]
B
Brett, I think this was the best idea that JetBlue had in modern history. JetBlue, it's a beloved brand, yada, yada, yada, but it isn't number one anywhere or really in anything. And so the team over there saw an opportunity in Fort Lauderdale, and they sent airplanes there as quickly as they could. But one interesting thing was they really thought that they were going to lose a lot of money there at the end of last year because they had very limited time to sell the flights. They actually told analysts that they were going to take a real material earnings hit for the quarter, the fourth quarter, because of that. But in the end, the effect was only half as bad as executives had thought on a relative basis. They said the new flying did very well for them very quickly.
- [15:50]
C
Yeah. And this was not a small announcement. Right. Like, it included seven new destinations in Latin America, plus New Orleans and Pittsburgh. And then it also included increased frequency on nine existing routes. Then in December, it added seven new routes only for travel during spring break. Meanwhile, Spirit was shrinking, shrinking, and shrinking again. But JetBlue, I mean, this is. This was a significant increase.
- [16:12]
A
Can I just take a quick aside really fast? I'm really curious. Is Fort Lauderdale as an airport getting more capacity and more flights than they had prior to Spirit's demise? I mean, is this airport actually growing as a. As a result of this?
- [16:29]
C
Not yet. So if I. Hold on.
- [16:33]
B
But, Brett, I see you going to your computer and searching, frantically going to Syrium.
- [16:37]
C
Hold on. I'm going to give you. Going to give you your answers.
- [16:39]
A
This is. This is a live question.
- [16:41]
C
Can we put in some, like, clickety, clickety, clickety sounds here? So In July of 2025, there were just shy of 1.6 million departing seats from Fort Lauderdale. For July of 26, it is 1.52 million. So it's down about 70,000 seats or so. But that is nothing considering the airport's largest airline just failed. So I don't think it'll be that long before they've been able to lap last year. And I know we're still pretty far out, but November, the gap's even closer, which is after JetBlue started its next round of flying.
- [17:22]
A
Interesting. Well, thank you for checking that. I think that's a really good context as we continue this discussion here. And JetBlue didn't even stop last year. They really just kept going. So in March, I think I remember that they added frequency on four more routes, right?
- [17:34]
C
That's right. And then at the end of March, JetBlue added frequency on another nine routes, plus announced a new route to Cleveland. And that led us to May 4, which was two days after Spirit shut down, when the airline added 11 new routes, with most starting in July, but some not until the fall.
- [17:49]
A
And a lot of those had actually pretty hefty frequencies. I know Baltimore, Charlotte, Houston, and Nashville all had like three daily.
- [17:55]
C
That's right. And that's because JetBlue is not only trying to serve the Fort Lauderdale destination market like everyone else, but it's trying to build an actual hub. It's first actual hub, actually.
- [18:05]
B
I guess they have finally erased the ghost of David Neilman. I'm glad that they did, guys, for a couple of reasons. One, I do not see how an airline can fill up that many new flights with just local traffic. Maybe over time, once you build the market, but that's a lot of new capacity. And then two, South Florida is a really great place for a Latin American connecting operation. Just ask the United people how much better it is than, say, Houston. But, Brett, has JetBlue ever done anything like this before? I know that it collects some people in New York and Boston to go to Europe and maybe some other spots, but it's never sold this level of connecting itineraries. Right?
- [18:47]
C
Yeah. JetBlue has never had more than 10% of passengers on a connecting flight, usually much lower than that. So, sure, it has connecting service. You can buy a ticket on a connection, but most people don't. And the focus cities are not built as true bank tubs. They're more spread out. But in Fort Lauderdale, they've just put an actual bank structure in place. It just recently started flying. It really takes off. When the new round of flying starts in July, there will be two morning and two afternoon slash evening banks.
- [19:18]
B
Brett, are they directional banks?
- [19:20]
C
They are directional banks meant to go with the flow of when people would want to go into the Caribbean, Latin America and then back later.
- [19:27]
A
So how is it doing this? I mean, is it just using the 15 gates better?
- [19:31]
C
No, that that wouldn't work. Most of its gates don't have access to customs and immigration, so JetBlue couldn't do anything with that. This needs to be a hub that can serve international and domestic, if not equally, at least pretty close to it. So it needed the Spirit gates in Terminal 4. When I looked earlier today, JetBlue had flights arriving at every gate in Terminal 4 except for G2 and G3. It's not that it owns those gates now, but it's the airline that jumped up to ut utilize them. And as utilization increases, it will gain preferential access. I'm not sure what the status of that is. I'm pretty sure that's how this works. But JetBlue filled that void so fast and you know, they calculated this thing well last year and they've executed it well.
- [20:13]
B
Wouldn't it be fun if we get a Chicago situation here in Fort Lauderdale and we can all be experts on gate usage requirements in Fort Lauderdale?
- [20:21]
C
The linear gate frontage of Fort Lauderdale? Yeah. The only thing I know is that to keep your gates you have to either average six daily flights plus 600 seats or a total of 800 seats. But I don't know how you actually get the gates in the first place. It seems like JetBlue just started using them. It's like squatters rights here.
- [20:40]
B
Brett, my understanding is that JetBlue is going to get maybe four or five gates in the Terminal 5 whenever that opens in a few years. I don't think those are international, but it's going to help JetBlue grow its footprint, right?
- [20:53]
C
Yeah, whenever that opens. But yeah, the four or five gates there are slated for JetBlue. Those fun fact were going to go to Allegiant if the JetBlue Spirit merger went through. That was part of the divestiture. But now those are JetBlue and you know, if it can have all those gates, that's a serious number of gates there and that will help it build more hub capacity, which means JetBlue becomes even more useful for locals. It can justify having more flights at more times. So Then the locals have more options and they use JetBlue more.
- [21:23]
B
Yeah. And it will finally have that number one position somewhere that matters. Back in the day, we know that was very important because scale matters so much in the airline industry, just in terms of getting airplanes where they need to go. That is still true. But as we have talked many times about on this show, if you're number one in a market, you're going to be able to hawk the most credit cards, which is very profitable. You can add your own lounges. Everything could be pretty good for JetBlue if. If it can be a real number one.
- [21:54]
A
Yeah, but doesn't it just mean that someone else is going to challenge you?
- [21:56]
C
Well, sure. I mean, we've talked about all that. So far. The possibilities, the legacies have done a little. I mean, United added an LAX flight, then Delta didn't like that, they doubled their LAX line. But that's all minor. And the other ones so far aren't really challenging. They're trying to find their niches.
- [22:10]
B
Yeah, the United thing is interesting because we know that United and JetBlue have their blue sky partnership, and it's gotten a little bit closer recently. JetBlue loyalists can earn miles and get benefits when flying United. I presume that the two airlines are pretty close, but this antitrust immunity or lack thereof is always a little bit tricky. We know that these two airlines can't coordinate schedules. And every now and then you do hear of two airlines that are partners but cannot talk to each other. They actually can get a little bit upset with each other over new routes, but hard to say that that's the case here.
- [22:48]
C
Yeah, I mean that. So what United does adds to what JetBlue has from a local loyalty perspective. They can get more international long haul. You know, go through United hubs to smaller cities, all that kind of stuff. It's more just gravy on top, I think, to help JetBlue become more competitive with American down the road. And that's really what I think this will turn into. You know, is. Is a JetBlue an American fight for the local traveler in South Florida. And if you have to compete with a legacy airline, I. We can all agree American is definitely the one you would choose right now.
- [23:23]
B
But why is that, Brett? Do you think there's something wrong with American Airlines?
- [23:27]
C
It's just the first in an alphabetical order, that's all. But look, even if American does treat this like an actual fight, this market's big enough and rich enough to support both airlines. JetBlue's made all the right moves so far. It may not reflect in profit immediately, but it'll get there if things keep going in this direction.
- [23:46]
B
Brett, I'm glad you brought up American because I mentioned before that the local catchment areas in Fort Lauderdale and Miami have a lot in common, but they're not exactly the same. Arguably I actually think Fort Lauderdale could be better and I'll doubt how often Marty St. George of JetBlue has been gushing about all these mint aircraft opportunities from Fort Lauderdale. If I had to guess about a really good airport in the United States for Premium Leisure, just on the definition of what market segments typically buy those fares, I'd probably go with Fort Lauderdale. Connecting wise though, catchment area doesn't matter as much, right? And the two airports are pretty much interchangeable. You should have the same roughly the same elapsed time on most itineraries. So I think a lot of it will come down to passengers saying where do I want to connect and on what airline? This is something St. George said on the fourth quarter earnings call earlier this year. He said for those customers who have connected in Miami versus Connecting in Fort Lauderdale, I think I know which one everyone would pick and it seems like customers are picking it and Fort Lauderdale has done very well for that. I heard that guys is a challenge to American. I do think American will defend its connecting business against JetBlue. But Brett, as you say, American has kind of been playing whack a mole recently in a lot of its hub markets and and you never know what it is going to do.
- [25:17]
C
No you do not. But meanwhile, while American is making its plans for Lauderdale is becoming a very different kind of airport. It is going to have to be able to support higher fares than Spirit was getting since those obviously did not make the airline any money. But JetBlue can still compete on price versus Miami potentially while developing an actual hub which will create real loyalty to the airline. And this is the first time Fort Lauderdale has really had that as a potential competitor to what's happening in Miami. Airlines like Allegiant and Breeze can help broaden the airport scope while the legacies continue to serve it as a notable spoke. But in general it's a good time to be fll.
- [25:55]
B
Except in July when it's really hot and it rains every day.
- [25:58]
C
I didn't say it was a good time to be in fll. It's a good time to be running the airport. I guess
- [26:06]
A
you've been listening to the air show. If you have suggestions or questions for us or interested in sponsoring the podcast. Go to our website, theairshowpodcast.com to get in touch.
- [26:14]
C
Leo Duran produced and edited this episode. Our theme music is by Joshua Mosher. Thanks for listening and we'll be back soon.
- [26:34]
A
Here I am, just ad libbing nerd.