{"id":774214,"date":"2026-05-05T05:34:12","date_gmt":"2026-05-05T05:34:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/774214\/"},"modified":"2026-05-05T05:34:12","modified_gmt":"2026-05-05T05:34:12","slug":"budget-airlines-seek-2-5-billion-in-federal-aid-as-fuel-costs-soar","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/774214\/","title":{"rendered":"Budget airlines seek $2.5 billion in federal aid as fuel costs soar"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"text | article-text text-start\"><b>PHOENIX (AZFamily)<\/b> \u2014 Budget airlines, including multiple that fly out of Sky Harbor International Airport, are asking the federal government for billions in aid as they navigate <a href=\"https:\/\/www.airlines.org\/dataset\/argus-us-jet-fuel-index\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.airlines.org\/dataset\/argus-us-jet-fuel-index\/\">jet fuel prices that have increased 70%<\/a> since the war with Iran began.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI just booked this a couple of weeks in advance because it was a budget,\u201d said Oty Dan, who was flying Frontier from Phoenix to Detroit. \u201cBecause it was a direct flight, it was very affordable at the same time.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Frontier ranked fifth at Sky Harbor in 2025, carrying <a href=\"https:\/\/www.skyharbor.com\/media\/rz3fadnw\/annual-stats-phx-2025.pdf\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.skyharbor.com\/media\/rz3fadnw\/annual-stats-phx-2025.pdf\">2.3 million passengers<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Ronald Corp, who was flying Frontier to Las Vegas, says he\u2019s a frequent flyer of the airline now.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI used to always be Delta, Delta, Delta, and then now with these quick trips since I moved from Buffalo to (Arizona), it just makes more sense,\u201d Corp said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Within the last couple of weeks, Frontier, Allegiant and Sun Country are among the <a href=\"https:\/\/flyava.org\/our-power\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/flyava.org\/our-power\">budget airlines<\/a> that <a href=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/video\/group-of-budget-airlines-pitched-us-government-for-25-billion-in-relief\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.cbsnews.com\/video\/group-of-budget-airlines-pitched-us-government-for-25-billion-in-relief\/\">requested $2.5 billion in federal assistance<\/a> because of the sharp increase in jet fuel prices.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI would say that at this point, I don\u2019t think it\u2019s necessary,\u201d Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy said during a press conference on Saturday. \u201cThey do have access to cash. If they want to come to the U.S. government, we would be a lender of last resort.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Spirit Airlines was part of the initial request for $2.5 billion and tried to reach a separate, last-minute $500 million deal with the Trump administration <a href=\"https:\/\/www.azfamily.com\/2026\/05\/02\/spirit-airlines-appears-closer-shutdown-time-dwindles-government-bailout\/\" target=\"_self\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" title=\"https:\/\/www.azfamily.com\/2026\/05\/02\/spirit-airlines-appears-closer-shutdown-time-dwindles-government-bailout\/\">before shutting down<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Dan said he was surprised the government did not bail out Spirit.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cIf they didn\u2019t bail Spirit out, they might not other ones,\u201d Dan said.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">Corp said he is not worried about the future of budget carriers.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text\">\u201cI think it\u2019s a fear anybody could have, but these prices won\u2019t be forever, that\u2019s another thing we got to look at,\u201d Corp said. \u201cThey never stay high.\u201d<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text text-start\">See a spelling or grammatical error in our story? <a href=\"https:\/\/www.azfamily.com\/page\/send-us-your-feedback\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Please click here to report it<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"text | article-text text-start\">Do you have a photo or video of a breaking news story? Send <a href=\"https:\/\/www.azfamily.com\/community\/user-content\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">it to us here<\/a> with a brief description.<\/p>\n<p>Copyright 2026 KTVK\/KPHO. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"PHOENIX (AZFamily) \u2014 Budget airlines, including multiple that fly out of Sky Harbor International Airport, are asking the&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":774215,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5131],"tags":[5229,5643,1587,7182,317235,31211,317236,317239,275906,1589,7183,317237,67,586,132,5230,68,2969,317238],"class_list":{"0":"post-774214","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-phoenix","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-arizona","10":"tag-az","11":"tag-azfamily","12":"tag-budget-airlines","13":"tag-federal-aid","14":"tag-fuel-costs-rise","15":"tag-iran-war-fuel-prices","16":"tag-jet-fuel-costs","17":"tag-phoenix","18":"tag-phoenix-news","19":"tag-spirit-airlines-shut-down","20":"tag-united-states","21":"tag-united-states-of-america","22":"tag-unitedstates","23":"tag-unitedstatesofamerica","24":"tag-us","25":"tag-usa","26":"tag-why-are-budget-airlines-shutting-down"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116520345165762614","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=774214"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/774214\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/774215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=774214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=774214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=774214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}