The suspension will go into effect April 7, the airline announced.
A Frontier A319 arrives at Lehigh Valley International Airport from Orlando back in May. The airline announced today it is suspending its nonstop service from LVIA to Orlando.
Frontier Airlines will end its nonstop service between Lehigh Valley International Airport and Orlando starting in April, the airline announced today.
The suspension will go into effect April 7. Flights after that date will be removed from the carrier's schedule on Sunday.
The Denver-based airline began service back in May at LVIA.
"Frontier is committed to providing its customers with convenient, low-fare service and relies heavily on airports keeping their costs competitive," Greg Aretakis, Frontier’s vice president, network and revenue, said in a news release. "Unfortunately, increasing fuel and other operating costs at Lehigh Valley International Airport have made it impossible to provide the low fares customers demand and, ultimately, we made the business decision to suspend our service."
The service suspension does not mean residents who use LVIA as a jumping point to Orlando are out of luck, according to Susan Kittle, business development director at the Lehigh-Northampton Airport Authority.
“The important message is, we still do have service to Orlando on Allegiant Airlines,” Kittle said.
Flights up until April 7 still will be with Frontier. After that, LVIA hopes to backfill the service with other carriers.
Counting Frontier, LVIA has five carriers that fly out of the airport. Though it is too early to say which airline will replace Frontier, if any. Kittle said “we continue to work on it and it’s a very high priority for us.”
Airport staff found out about Frontier’s withdrawal Wednesday, she said.
Only beginning flights out of LVIA in May, Frontier spent less than a year in the Lehigh Valley.
It is the second airline to say this year it will drop service at LVIA, where traffic is down 13.5 percent year to date.
AirTran Airways, now part of Southwest Airlines, which ended LVIA flights in August. Southwest pulled the service as it integrated AirTran into its airline system.