This airline is furloughing nearly 400 Las Vegas flight attendants

In a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act notice filed with the state of Nevada, Nick Bartolotta, senior vice president of guest experience and crew operations at the Florida-based airline, said the furloughs — expected to be a temporary reduction of the work force — could begin Dec. 1 or within 14 days of that date.

The WARN Act, a federal law, requires employers with more than 100 full-time workers to provide 60 days’ written notice of a pending shutdown or layoff. Notice must be made to affected employees or their union representatives and to the state’s dislocated worker unit, which is the Department of Employment, Training and Rehabilitation in Nevada.

Spirit’s workers are represented by the Association of Flight Attendants union.

“This furlough is expected to be temporary; however, we are unsure as to the duration,” the letter said. “Further, this furlough is subject to the terms of the applicable collective bargaining agreement (CBA). Bumping rights (that is, the right to avoid furlough by displacing another employee) if any, for union employees will be governed by the applicable CBA between the company and the union.”

Spirit, operating under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, has seen passenger counts at Reid International plummet through 2025. In August, when the airline filed its second bankruptcy petition in 10 months, passenger counts were off 46.3 percent to 409,886.

Spirit also filed for bankruptcy in November 2024 after a failed merger with JetBlue Airways. It emerged from that bankruptcy in March but refiled in August. Since the start of 2025, traffic has been down 32 percent to 3.6 million.

While the airline reorganizes its finances, it continues to sell tickets and fly and passengers can use tickets and loyalty points, but several routes have been eliminated.

Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on X.